Brands
Rishabh Pant strides back to adidas as campaign face
MUMBAI: From boundary-smashing innings to fearless comebacks, Rishabh Pant has always been a cricketer who plays on the front foot. Now, the dynamic wicketkeeper-batsman is back with adidas, as the sportswear giant signs a multi-year partnership with the Indian cricket star. This collaboration sees Pant rejoin adidas’ elite athlete roster, which already boasts names like Jude Bellingham, Noah Lyles, Kuldeep Yadav, and Nikhat Zareen.
Pant, who previously partnered with adidas from 2016 to 2019, returns to the fold, further strengthening the brand’s deep-rooted legacy in Indian cricket—one that has seen collaborations with legends like Sachin Tendulkar and Rohit Sharma. With his never-give-up attitude and unwavering self-belief, Pant perfectly embodies the adidas ethos of resilience and excellence.
Adidas India general manager Neelendra Singh said, “At adidas, we stand by athletes through every high and low, supporting their journey to greatness. Rishabh’s fearless spirit and dedication to the game make him a perfect fit for our brand. We are thrilled to have him back in the adidas family.”
Pant said, “adidas is a brand I have always admired. We share a vision of inspiring athletes and pushing boundaries. I look forward to this journey, empowering the next generation and making a lasting impact in the world of sports.”
With a history of championing top athletes across cricket, football, athletics, and tennis, adidas continues to be at the forefront of sporting excellence. The addition of Pant to its roster reaffirms its commitment to shaping the future of Indian sports, ensuring the next generation has the support they need to dream big and play bigger.
Brands
Samsung certifies 1,000 Maharashtra students in AI and coding
The South Korean electronics giant marks its first large-scale skilling push in the state, with women making up nearly half the national programme’s enrolment
PUNE: Samsung has put 1,000 students in Maharashtra through a certified training programme in artificial intelligence and coding, the largest such drive the South Korean electronics company has run in the state and a signal that corporate India’s skilling ambitions are moving well beyond the boardroom brochure.
The certifications were awarded under Samsung Innovation Campus (SIC), the company’s flagship corporate social responsibility programme, which launched in India in 2022 with the stated aim of democratising access to future-technology education. The 1,000 graduates were drawn from four institutions: 127 from Savitribai Phule Pune University, 373 from Pimpri Chinchwad University, 250 from D.Y. Patil University’s Ramrao Adik Institute of Technology and 250 from Anjuman-I-Islam’s Kalsekar Technical Campus. All completed training in either AI or coding and programming, the two disciplines Samsung has identified as the critical pillars of the digital economy.
The programme does not stop at technical training. Soft-skills development and career-readiness modules are baked into the curriculum, a deliberate attempt to close the gap between what universities teach and what employers actually want.
“India’s digital growth story will ultimately be shaped by the quality of its talent pipeline,” said Shubham Mukherjee, head of CSR and corporate communications at Samsung Southwest Asia. “As technologies like AI move from the periphery to the core of industries, skilling must evolve from basic training to building real-world capability. This milestone in Maharashtra reflects how industry and academia can come together to create a future-ready workforce that is both globally competitive and locally relevant.”
The Maharashtra drive sits within a rapidly scaling national effort. Samsung Innovation Campus trained 20,000 young people across India in 2025, hitting its stated target for the year. Women account for 48 per cent of national enrolments, a figure the company cites as evidence of its push for an inclusive technology ecosystem. The programme is implemented in partnership with the Electronics Sector Skills Council of India and the Telecom Sector Skill Council.
Samsung, which is marking 30 years in India this year, runs SIC alongside two other initiatives, Samsung Solve for Tomorrow and Samsung DOST, as part of a broader effort to build what it calls a generation of innovators with both the technical depth and the problem-solving mindset to thrive in a fast-moving digital world.
A thousand certified students is a tidy headline. Whether they find jobs that match their new skills is the harder question, and the one that will ultimately determine whether corporate skilling programmes like this one are genuine pipelines or well-photographed gestures.
