MAM
Mindshare appoints M K Machaiah as chief innovation officer
MUMBAI: India’s largest full service media agency, Mindshare, a part of GroupM has appointed MK Machaiah, known as Mac, as chief innovation officer for South Asia.
In this role, Mac will lead the integrated approach to consumer engagement and strengthen brand propositions across all consumer touchpoints including traditional, social and experiential. He will be responsible for setting up an innovations lab through systemic integrations of content + social and activations and building sports practice. He will build future-ready capabilities and revenue models by assessing the scope of each practice, set the innovation vision & drive the team to work on client specific propositions. Mac has worked across global markets and has proven ability to bring together different cultural nuances which will be critical in the integration of these two diverse practices.
After spending over a decade in different media agencies including a two-year stint with Mindshare India, Mac became an integral part of the India leadership team in 2012 as office head, South. He then progressed to chief executive officer, SSA to lead Mindshare Sub Saharan Africa region where he was entrusted with the responsibility to set up Mindshare and consolidate the Unilever business across the region and drive global best practices.
Mindshare South Asia CEO Prasanth Kumar says, “Mac has been a part of the Mindshare family and comes with credible and rich experience in the industry. We have always taken not just the lead but also the leap in defining industry’s best practices and becoming the trusted marketing partners for our clients. To take this leap, we have appointed Mac who brings experience across industries and markets, which makes him the perfect fit to assist in the growth of the agency.”
MK Machaiah chief innovation officer South Asia adds, “Mindshare is one of the largest media agencies and I am delighted to embark on a new journey with them. It’s an honour to be a part of an organisation with great stature in the industry. I am excited to be working with some of the top creative and strategic minds in the industry at Mindshare. I look forward to utilise my knowledge and experience to fortify our position in the market and assert the trust of our partners and consumers”
MUMBAI: In India’s fast-moving payments race, Visa has just swiped in a new leader. The company has named Suresh Sethi as its India country head, marking a key leadership shift as it sharpens its focus on digital payments growth in the market. Sethi steps into the role following his recent exit from Protean eGov Technologies, where he served as chief executive officer. He succeeds Sandeep Ghosh, who has moved on after more than four years at Visa to pursue an external opportunity.
The appointment comes at a time when Visa is doubling down on its expansion strategy across India and the wider region, deepening partnerships and accelerating adoption in an increasingly competitive digital payments ecosystem.
Sethi brings with him a broad, cross-market perspective shaped by decades of experience across corporate banking, retail financial services, mobile money and large-scale government technology initiatives. He began his career at Citigroup, where he spent 14 years working across India, Africa, South America and the United States, focusing on transaction banking services within the corporate bank.
His appointment signals a blend of institutional experience and market familiarity qualities that could prove critical as Visa navigates a landscape where fintech innovation, regulatory evolution and consumer adoption are all accelerating at once.
As digital payments in India continue to scale rapidly, the leadership change underscores a simple reality, in a market where every tap, scan and swipe counts, who leads the charge can matter just as much as the technology itself.
