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Ipsos India appoints Amit Adarkar as its managing director
MUMBAI: Ipsos India has found a new country head and managing director in Amit Adarkar, who will take charge from first week of September. He replaces Mick Gordon who successfully held the role and will now take up a senior regional responsibility within Ipsos.
Gordon has been CEO of Ipsos India since November 2011 and managing director of Synovate India since September 2008. He has been responsible for substantial growth of revenue and profits over the period and merger of two large businesses of Ipsos and Synovate in India.
Commenting on Adarkar’s appointment, Gordon said, “I am confident that with the experience and expertise of Amit, Ipsos will continue to delight our clients and he will prove to be an immensely capable successor.”
“I am delighted to be appointed as Ipsos India’s new managing director. Ipsos is at a decisive point in its history and I am looking forward to working with the Board, the Regional Directors and Ipsos India staff to ensure we take this opportunity to create a stronger and more effective organisation for the future,” added Adarkar.
Adarkar who had joined Ipsos InnoQuest, India as its managing director in January 2013 has been a member of the India management team ever since.
He has been in the research industry for over 22 years, and has worked for organisations such as IMRB, Synovate, and Org-Marg. He was earlier MD at Market Probe, and a VP at Nielsen-Bases. He also has rich experience with a number of key Ipsos InnoQuest clients.
He is a chemical engineer from Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (1987-91). Post engineering, he completed Post Graduate Diploma in Business Management (PGDBM), from XLRI, Jamshedpur (1991-1993).
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Paramount set to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery in $81 billion deal
Shareholders back merger, combined entity could reshape streaming and studios.
MUMBAI: Lights, camera… consolidation, Hollywood’s latest blockbuster might be happening off-screen. Shareholders of Warner Bros. Discovery have voted in favour of selling the company to Paramount in a deal valued at $81 billion rising to nearly $111 billion including debt setting the stage for one of the biggest shake-ups in modern media. The proposed merger, still subject to regulatory approvals, would bring together a vast portfolio spanning HBO Max, CNN, and franchises such as Harry Potter under the same umbrella as Paramount’s own heavyweights, including Top Gun and CBS.
At the heart of the deal is streaming scale. Executives have indicated plans to combine HBO Max and Paramount+ into a single platform, potentially creating a stronger challenger to giants like Netflix and Amazon’s Prime Video. Current market data suggests HBO Max holds around 12 per cent of US on-demand subscriptions, compared to Paramount+’s 3 per cent, together still trailing Netflix’s 19 per cent and Disney’s combined 27 per cent via Disney+ and Hulu.
Paramount CEO David Ellison has signalled that while platforms may merge, HBO’s creative identity will remain intact, stating the brand should “stay HBO” even within a broader ecosystem.
Beyond streaming, the deal would redraw the map for film production. Combining two of Hollywood’s oldest studios Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros., the new entity aims to scale output to over 30 films annually, while maintaining a 45-day theatrical window. Warner Bros. currently commands around 21 per cent of the US box office, compared to Paramount’s 6 per cent, underscoring the strategic weight of the acquisition.
But scale comes with scrutiny. Critics warn that fewer players could mean reduced consumer choice, rising subscription costs, and potential job cuts as the combined company looks to streamline overlapping operations while managing billions in debt.
The news business, too, faces a reset. CNN would join forces at least structurally with Paramount-owned CBS, raising questions about editorial independence and positioning. The merger has already drawn political attention in the United States, particularly given perceived ties between the Ellison family and Donald Trump, though the company maintains that newsroom autonomy will be preserved.
If approved, the deal would mark another milestone in Hollywood’s consolidation wave shrinking the industry’s traditional “big six” studios to a “big four”, with Paramount joining Disney, Universal, and Sony at the top table.
In an industry built on storytelling, this merger may well become its most consequential plot twist yet.
