MAM
Pepperfry & Infra.Market partner to elevate CX and product range
Mumbai: E-commerce furniture and home décor company – Pepperfry and Infra.Market, a construction materials company with its in-house brand Ivas, have announced a partnership to enhance customer experience and expand product offerings. Pepperfry products will be available in Infra.Market stores, while Ivas will be featured in Pepperfry locations, creating a one-stop destination for home needs.
Starting from October, the companies will launch store-in-store (SIS) formats of Pepperfry in Infra.Market locations in cities including Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Kolhapur, Sangli, Aurangabad, Alibaug, Panvel, Nagpur, and Nashik. Ivas will also support Pepperfry’s modular furniture segment in stores across Mumbai, Pune, Baroda, Ahmedabad, Chandigarh, and Kolkata. This collaboration will provide a curated selection from multiple brands, allowing customers to visualise and plan their projects effectively.
Over the next three months, Pepperfry plans to establish more than 20 SIS formats in Infra.Market stores, while Ivas aims to increase its presence in Pepperfry locations.
Speaking about the partnership, Pepperfry co-founder and CEO Ashish Shah said, “This partnership with Infra.Market and Ivas, reiterates our mission to deliver a comprehensive and seamless home solutions experience to our customers. With this collaboration, we can leverage each other’s extensive network of stores and supply chain infrastructure to enhance our offering and provide a one-stop destination for all home needs to our customers – from tiles, custom modular furniture, electricals, paints, sanitaryware to home decor, mattress and furniture, all under one roof. Customers across these cities will now have access to 1,000s of brands and 100s of product categories through a unique omnichannel experience.”
The collaboration aims to meet the demand for comprehensive home and construction material solutions by introducing dedicated sections in Infra.Market and Pepperfry stores, featuring building materials alongside home furnishings.
Ivas, backed by Infra.Market, is transforming the home building and renovation sector by offering a wide range of products, including tiles, slabs, quartz, sanitaryware, bath fittings, fans, lighting, appliances, modular kitchens and wardrobes, designer hardware, and laminates.
Infra.Market co-founder Aaditya Sharda added, “Our partnership with Pepperfry marks a significant step in our commitment to simplifying home building by offering customers unparalleled access to diverse solutions that meet their needs.” He further added, “At Ivas, we understand that homemakers invest their hearts into creating comfortable spaces. Our collaboration with Pepperfry enhances this endeavor by seamlessly connecting high-quality building materials with stylish décor options. Together, we are addressing the diverse needs of homeowners across India by bridging construction and furnishing, ultimately transforming houses into dream homes.”
Digital
Ethical AI must benefit society, not dominate it, says WFEB chief Sanjay Pradhan at IAA event
At Mumbai event, ethics expert urges businesses and governments to shape AI responsibly
MUMBAI: Artificial intelligence may be racing ahead at lightning speed, but its direction must still be guided by human conscience. That was the central message delivered by Sanjay Pradhan, president of the World Forum for Ethics in Business (WFEB), during the latest edition of IAA Conversations held in Mumbai.
The session was organised by the International Advertising Association (IAA) and the Artificial Intelligence Association of India (AIAI) in association with The Free Press Journal at the Free Press House on 7 March. Addressing a packed audience, Pradhan called for stronger ethical leadership to ensure AI remains a tool that benefits humanity rather than one that governs it.
“Artificial intelligence has rapidly become one of the most powerful technologies humanity has created,” Pradhan said. “It is unlocking breakthroughs in medicine, science and creativity at a pace unimaginable just a few years ago.”
But he warned that the same technology carries serious risks. AI, he noted, can amplify disinformation faster than facts can travel, compromise privacy, deepen discrimination and disrupt millions of livelihoods. Referencing concerns raised by AI pioneers such as Geoffrey Hinton, often called the godfather of AI, Pradhan stressed that the real challenge is not whether AI will shape the world, but whether humans will shape it with ethics and wisdom.
Structuring his talk around four guiding questions, why, what, how and who, Pradhan introduced the audience to WFEB’s emerging AI Ethics Partnership, a global platform aimed at advancing responsible artificial intelligence. He outlined four priority concerns that demand urgent attention: disinformation, bias and discrimination, data privacy and job security.
To make the idea of ethical AI easier to grasp, Pradhan offered a simple metaphor. Ethical AI, he said, is like a three layered cake. The outer layer represents the visible value ethical AI creates for businesses and society. The middle layer is organisational culture that moves ethics from written codes to everyday practice. The innermost layer, however, is the most crucial, the conscience of individual leaders.
Drawing from Indian philosophical thought through WFEB co-founder Ravi Shankar, Pradhan noted that while artificial intelligence can reproduce stored knowledge, true intelligence is boundless and rooted in conscience, creativity and compassion. Practices such as breathwork and meditation, he suggested, can help leaders develop the calm clarity needed for ethical decision making.
The event also featured a discussion with Maninder Adityaraj Singh, chief of staff and head of innovation at Rediffusion Brand Solutions Pvt Ltd, and Yash Johri, lawyer, Supreme Court of India.
Opening the session, IAA India chapter president Abhishek Karnani, highlighted the need for industries to understand and engage with AI responsibly.
“AI has to be befriended and understood,” added Rediffusion managing director and AIAI national convenor Sandeep Goyal. “Its ethical use will determine whether it becomes a friend or a foe.”
As AI continues to reshape industries and societies, Pradhan ended with a simple but powerful call to action. Businesses, governments and individuals must work together to ensure that the algorithms shaping the future reflect human values rather than just cold logic.
