Brands
Shalimar Paints gives its painter squad a fan-tastic brush with cricket
MUMBAI: They say the devil is in the details—but at Shalimar Paints’ latest event in Delhi, the devil was definitely in the DIY cricket games, branded gear, and pure painter-powered energy. In a bold move to fuse fandom with functionality, Shalimar Paints kicked off its partnership with Mumbai Indians for the 2025 season with a vibrant, invite-only celebration for its painter community and influencers.
Held in the capital on 10 April 2025, the bash featured a heady mix of games, contests, giveaways, and limited-edition Mumbai Indians x Shalimar merchandise, offering a technicolour evening of bonding, banter, and brushes.
“Our community of painters is at the core of everything we do… this partnership allows us to create fresh and exciting experiences for this community,” said Shalimar Paints director Kuldip Raina.
More than just an appreciation dinner with fancy lighting, the event was a grassroots masterstroke in upskilling and brand building, tapping into both nostalgia and next-gen marketing muscle. It also featured exclusive schemes on Shalimar products, along with opportunities for painters to engage directly with influencers and fellow community champions.
“This was not just a branding opportunity… this is only the beginning,” noted Shalimar Paints head of marketing Varun Malik, hinting at more citywide paint-and-play events to come.
The Delhi event marks the first in a series of painter-first engagements to roll out across Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Patna, Kolkata, Delhi, Lucknow, Jaipur, and more. It’s a move aimed at igniting brand love where it matters most: on the ground, in the streets, and in the hands of the people with the brushes.
With over 120 years in the business, Shalimar Paints knows a thing or two about long-lasting finishes. And with Mumbai Indians backing them this IPL, it looks like they’re just getting started on a bold new coat of fan-first branding.
Brands
Rakesh Menon joins Paytm as avp – lending
Fintech product leader takes on new role after building digital lending, payments and credit products across fintech ecosystem
MUMBAI: Rakesh Menon has joined Paytm as assistant vice president – lending, taking on a new role focused on strengthening the company’s lending and credit products.
Prior to this, Menon worked at Profectus Capital Pvt Ltd as chief manager – payments based financing and digital lending.
At Profectus, he designed and launched digital credit products for merchants with variable cash flows, including overdraft-linked and revenue-share lending models. He led end-to-end LOS–LMS API integrations with payment partners and aggregators, enabling real-time underwriting, disbursal and repayment workflows.
He also worked on funnel optimisation initiatives using journey analytics, improving onboarding, KYC and disbursal conversion by 35 per cent. He developed ecosystem partnerships for transaction-data-based credit assessment and automated settlement systems, and collaborated with credit and data science teams to strengthen risk models and early delinquency detection.
Menon standardised partner onboarding and API frameworks, reducing go-live timelines by 40 per cent and improving digital scalability.
Before Profectus Capital, he worked at PayU as senior manager – presales lead – enterprise business from August 2022 to August 2023. He set up a national presales function for fintech and digital commerce clients, aligning solutions such as EMI, BNPL, BBPS and offer engines to merchant requirements.
He also helped improve conversion rates by around 15 per cent through merchant persona mapping, demo frameworks and structured sales playbooks, working closely with product and go-to-market teams.
From April 2019 to July 2022, Menon served as business unit head – SMB – direct acquisitions at Worldline, where he built the SMB online payments vertical from scratch. The business scaled to Rs 2,500 crore in annual transaction volume, growing at 45 per cent year-on-year.
During this period, he introduced paperless onboarding processes including eKYC and eSign, developed partner dashboards and CRM automation systems, and integrated platforms such as Shopify, WooCommerce and Tally to expand merchant adoption.
Across roles, Menon has worked across digital lending, payments and merchant financing, with experience in product development, ecosystem partnerships, API integrations and fintech-led growth strategies.
At Paytm, he will focus on scaling lending products and strengthening digital credit infrastructure within the company’s financial services ecosystem.
His appointment comes as fintech firms continue to expand their lending and embedded finance offerings in a competitive market.
