Brands
Pine Labs appoints Shalini Pillai as CMO
Former Microsoft marketing director to steer global brand
MUMBAI: Fintech platform Pine Labs has named Shalini Pillai as its new chief marketing officer, handing her the reins of global marketing, product marketing, marcom and brand positioning as the company sharpens its worldwide ambitions.
Pillai joins from Microsoft, where she served as marketing director for India and South Asia. Her career reads like a tour of modern tech marketing. At Google, she led consumer apps marketing in India, steered GPay and new business initiatives marketing, and earlier drove growth across the India SMB segment. Long before big tech, she co-founded BrandIdea Consultancy, building tools for market planning and ROI analytics, and began her journey at Coca-Cola India in sales and brand roles.
An MBA from the Indian School of Business, Pillai brings more than two decades of experience spanning boardrooms and bootstraps, B2C buzz and B2B backbone.
Announcing the appointment, Pine Labs chief executive B. Amrish Rau said Pillai’s technology-led marketing pedigree and data-driven approach make her well placed to lead the company’s next chapter of transformation and growth. He noted her track record in scaling digital products and building integrated brand and product engines across global markets.
For her part, Pillai sees fintech’s future in seamless infrastructure. She described Pine Labs as sitting at the crossroads of merchant relationships and sovereign-scale technology, turning consumer intent into instant execution. Her mandate is clear: craft an integrated market strategy and expand the company’s footprint to deliver compounding commercial value worldwide.
The move comes as Pine Labs doubles down on artificial intelligence across its payments stack and developer tools, and deepens its collaboration with OpenAI. With a seasoned marketer now at the helm, the company appears ready to tell its next growth story with sharper focus and a louder voice.
Brands
Sony Pictures Networks India names Shruti Aneja as lead – agency partnerships & key network initiatives
Aneja takes charge to deepen agency ties and boost revenue across Spni channels
MUMBAI: Sony Pictures Networks India has appointed Shruti Aneja as lead – agency partnerships, signalling a fresh focus on closer collaboration with advertising agencies and a sharper push for revenue growth across its channel portfolio.
In her new role, Aneja will chart strategic engagement with agencies, unlock new revenue streams, and nurture long-term partnerships. Her mission includes driving sales performance, adding value for clients, and delivering inventive solutions for advertisers — cementing Spni’s position as a preferred media partner.
Aneja brings over 12 years of experience with Spni, having risen through the ranks from manager to associate vice president. She has led high-performing sales teams across key clusters including sony hindi gec, free-to-air channels, and english entertainment channels like pix, axn and bbc earth.
Her track record includes driving integrated ad sales for popular shows such as Celebrity MasterChef, Indian Idol and Superstar Singer, pioneering first-time brand integrations, and repositioning channels for maximum impact in both urban and rural markets.
Aneja’s approach combines content-first thinking with solution-led selling, focusing on empathy, insight and storytelling that resonates with audiences and brands alike. Colleagues praise her knack for building trust with agencies and clients while spotting innovative ways to convert ideas into revenue.
With this appointment, Spni aims to strengthen its agency relationships and continue delivering compelling advertising solutions that combine creativity with performance.
