MAM
Interbrand strengthens India leadership; announces new appointments and elevations
Mumbai: Brand consultancy – Interbrand has bolstered its leadership team by appointing four executives in elevated and new roles, with the goal in mind to drive strategic partnerships, accelerate growth, and burgeon overall enterprise value.
Satish Krishnamurthy assumes the role of chief strategy officer. Ameya Kapnadak takes on the role of chief growth officer and head of consulting – Interbrand India. Payal Shah has been named the strategy director and head – human truths, India. Rahul Bansal will function as the strategy director and head of brand economics, India.
Speaking about the new leadership team, Interbrand India, India & South Asia CEO Ashish Mishra said, “We had a late entry into the Indian market but were able to achieve local leadership for the world’s leading brand consultancy in a very short span. We have the top five branding projects of the decade as our showreel. Winning and delivering these iconic brand transformations, including Godrej, Jio, Britannia, Infosys, Mahindra, Hero MotoCorp, and Nerolac, took brilliant and committed talent.”
“Most of whom have been the core of our team for most of our history. Our people have grown with the firm and are poised well to create the next generation of icons. At Interbrand, our priority is to nurture a global community of thinkers and makers with the curiosity and confidence to create iconic work,” he added.
Satish Krishnamurthy brings 21 years of global strategic experience to Interbrand, having worked across brand consulting, creative strategy, and design thinking. His diverse experience straddles from driving strategic mandates for large agencies in the US and India, to being a behavioural architect, and also being a Ted X speaker. Satish has crafted unique ways to solve problems by taking inspiration from various disciplines. He has impacted successful outcomes for large clients across positioning, service and experience design, and opportunity consulting.
Ameya Kapnadak leads the growth and consulting teams at Interbrand’s India office. Over the last 25 years, he has worked on and built some of India’s most iconic brands. Ameya has a wide and deep experience across diverse industries, including technology, banking and finance, automotives, consumer goods, food, and fashion and retail. He started his branding career at J Walter Thompson, and has since worked at Mudra, ICICI Bank, and The Times Group, before joining Interbrand in 2011. Ameya is a pharmacist by qualification and holds a master’s degree in management from the Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies.
As a strategy director at Interbrand, Payal Shah’s approach is to help brands rise to meaningful arenas for growth and sustainable iconic leadership. Possessing a multi-faceted personality and more than 15 years of experience in USA and India, she has been working across categories such as spirits, FMCG, technology and fashion. Some of her clients in the past were Pernod Ricard, Britannia and Gucci. Payal believes in the power of storytelling and delves into experiences for brands that inhabit them. She believes in purposeful innovation that harnesses behavioural data in order to amplify brand growth and value creation. Beyond creating brands, she’s a brand mentor at Ecole Intuit-Lab and the host of ‘Design Rendezvous’.
Rahul Bansal joined Interbrand India in 2016 in their strategy vertical. In this role, he has helped with the expansion of Interbrand’s footprint in South Asia across Sri Lanka, UAE, and Bangladesh while also leading projects for some of the largest public and private sector brands in India. Prior to Interbrand, Rahul has worked across a diverse range of functions and sectors, including business consulting to help bring global consumer brands into India, gaming, and e-commerce in Southeast Asia.
Brands
YES Bank hands the keys to SBI veteran Vinay Tonse as it bets on a new era
Former SBI managing director appointed as YES Bank’s new MD and CEO
MUMBAI: YES Bank is done rebuilding. Now it wants to grow. The private sector lender has appointed Vinay Muralidhar Tonse as managing director and chief executive officer-designate, with RBI approval secured and a start date of April 6, 2026 confirmed. The three-year term signals the bank’s intent to shift gears from crisis recovery to full-throttle expansion.
Tonse, 60, is no stranger to scale. Most recently managing director at State Bank of India, he oversaw a retail book of roughly $800bn in deposits and advances, one of the largest in the country. Before that, he ran SBI Mutual Fund from August 2020 to December 2022, a stint that saw assets under management surge from Rs 4.32 lakh crore to Rs 7.32 lakh crore across market cycles. Add stints in Singapore and four years leading SBI’s overseas operations in Osaka, and the incoming chief arrives with a genuinely global CV.
His academic grounding is equally solid: a commerce degree from St Joseph’s College of Commerce, Bengaluru, and a master’s in commerce from Bangalore University.
The appointment follows an extensive search and evaluation process by the bank’s Nomination and Remuneration Committee. NRC chairperson Nandita Gurjar said the committee unanimously backed Tonse, citing his leadership track record, governance credentials and ability to drive the bank’s next phase of transformation.
Non-executive chairman Rama Subramaniam Gandhi was unequivocal. “I am certain that Vinay Tonse, with his vast experience as a senior banker, will propel YES Bank to its next phase of growth,” Gandhi said, adding that the bank remains focused on strengthening its retail and corporate banking franchises and expanding its branch network.
Rajeev Kannan, non-executive director and senior executive at Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, the bank’s largest shareholder, said Tonse’s experience across retail, corporate banking, global markets and asset management positioned him well to lead the lender. SMBC said it looks forward to working with Tonse and the board as YES Bank pursues its ambition of becoming a top-tier private sector lender anchored in strong governance and sustainable growth.
Tonse succeeds Prashant Kumar, who took the helm in March 2020 when YES Bank was in freefall following a severe financial crisis, and spent six years painstakingly stabilising the institution, rebuilding governance and restoring operational scale. Gandhi was generous: “The bank remains indebted to Prashant Kumar, who is responsible for much of what a strong financial powerhouse YES Bank is today.”
Tonse, for his part, struck a purposeful note. “Together with the board and my colleagues, I remain deeply committed to creating long-term value for all our stakeholders,” he said, pledging to build on Kumar’s foundation guided by his personal motto: Make A Difference.
Beyond the balance sheet, Tonse played cricket at college and club level and represented Karnataka in archery at the national championships — sports he credits with teaching him teamwork, situational leadership, discipline and focus. In quieter moments, he reaches for retro Kannada music, classic Hindi songs, and the crooning of Engelbert Humperdinck, Mukesh and Kishore Kumar.
YES Bank has its steady-handed rebuilder in Kumar to thank for survival. Now it has a scale-obsessed growth banker at the wheel. The next chapter starts April 6.
