MAM
Pocket Aces elevates Vinay Pillai to head of strategy
MUMBAI: Homegrown digital entertainment company, Pocket Aces, has elevated Vinay Pillai to the dual position of head of strategy and head of clout. Vinay joined Pocket Aces in 2020 to scale Clout, its influencer management business, and has played a crucial role in getting it to a leadership position.
In this enhanced role, Vinay will work on establishing key strategic partnerships that will not only aid in scaling the current revenue and profitability but also cement Pocket Aces’ leadership position in the sector long-term. Prior to Pocket Aces, Vinay was the co-founder of dekkho, India’s first content streaming OTT platform. Post dekkho, he headed the OTT platform at The Viral Fever, called TVF Play.
Vinay is a computer science engineer and an MS from Columbia University, New York. He spent most of his career in product and strategy consulting with companies like DramaFever, DocPlace, and Booz in the US before returning to India.
Commenting on his new position, Vinay Pillai shared, “I am extremely excited to take up this crucial additional responsibility to shape our strategic direction along with Aditi. Leading Clout over the last few years has been an absolute pleasure, and I have thoroughly enjoyed building it from scratch to a market leader today with an amazing team. Additionally, I look forward to now working with Pocket Aces’ finest leaders across other business units to help them scale our company to even greater heights. We have prided ourselves on always doing things in a data-backed way with a huge impetus on innovation. I feel honoured to now get to contribute in a Pocket Aces wide central capacity with our stellar young team and would like to thank Aditi for the opportunity.”
Pocket Aces co-founder & CEO Aditi Shrivastava said, “For the head of strategy role, I wanted someone who would work alongside me to add to our vision of taking our cutting-edge media business to the next level. Vinay is a non-linear thinker. He has founder blood, as well as a blend of consulting and operational experience. These give him a unique vantage point on how to take on incumbents while also giving him the hard operational expertise of scaling businesses on the ground with growing teams. Vinay has done an excellent job of scaling Clout, and I’m excited to see him in this enhanced role. Vinay will be working closely with the rest of our management team, who will take the lead in putting our strategic direction into action.”
Brands
Boeing appoints Barun as head of FP&A for global engineering function
Seasoned finance leader to steer budgets and strategy across global centres
BENGALURU: Boeing’s finance cockpit has a new pilot, and he is no stranger to turbulence or transformation. Boeing has appointed Barun as head of FP&A for global engineering, placing him at the centre of financial strategy for its worldwide engineering and technology operations.
Based in Bengaluru, Barun steps into a role that is as expansive as it is critical. He will serve as the primary finance lead for Boeing’s Engineering and Technology Centers globally, working closely with executive leadership to shape financial decisions, manage complex budgets, and design scalable finance processes that support the company’s growing engineering footprint.
In a note announcing his move Barun said, “I’m excited to share that I’ve joined Boeing Global Engineering. This opportunity is incredibly meaningful to me not just from a professional standpoint, but also for what Boeing represents globally.” He added that he looks forward to contributing to an organisation that continues to shape the future of aerospace and innovation.
Barun’s mandate spans strategic financial leadership, operational oversight, and stakeholder engagement. From directing large-scale budgets and schedules to influencing long-term organisational goals, the role blends financial discipline with business foresight. He will also lead cross-functional teams and partner with finance colleagues worldwide to support engineering programmes across geographies, including India.
The appointment caps a long stint at Juniper Networks, where Barun spent over a decade, most recently as finance senior manager. There, he led FP&A for global product business units and G&A functions, driving budgeting, forecasting, and long-range planning. He also played a key role in enterprise-wide transformation, including spearheading an Oracle to SAP ERP migration and building advanced analytics capabilities using tools such as Tableau and SAP Analytics Cloud.
His earlier career includes finance leadership roles at Sony India Software Centre, Cognizant Technology Solutions, and Mphasis, where he focused on financial planning, governance frameworks, and operational efficiency across global delivery centres.
A chartered accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, Barun brings nearly two decades of experience across financial planning, digital transformation, and analytics-led decision making.
His appointment comes at a time when global engineering operations are becoming increasingly complex and distributed, requiring sharper financial oversight and agile planning. With Barun at the helm of FP&A for engineering, Boeing appears to be tightening its financial playbook as it looks to scale innovation with discipline.
