MAM
Sungkyoon Kim takes charge as president and chief executive of Cheil SWA
Data and AI veteran to steer 1,000-strong team as agency doubles down on tech-led marketing
GURGAON: Cheil South West Asia has named Sungkyoon Kim as president and chief executive of the Cheil SWA group, handing the reins to a data-and-digital heavyweight as advertising hurtles into its AI age.
Based at the agency’s Gurgaon headquarters, Kim will lead a 1,000-strong talent pool across Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai and Kolkata, spanning creative, data, technology, retail, media and experiential.
Kim brings more than 30 years’ experience in marketing strategy, data and analytics, and consumer psychology. He joins after serving as head of digital platform business, overseeing Samsung.com, and leading the DnA (data and analytics) center at Cheil, where he drove CRM and data initiatives.
His track record leans heavily on data-led transformation. He has led programmes to strengthen CRM, media, marketing and AI capabilities, including the design and deployment of a real-time digital media optimisation platform that integrated cross-channel spend and performance data to sharpen investment efficiency and ROI. He also pushed the development and rollout of LLM-powered AI agents for real-time analysis and automated insight generation.
An Adobe Experience Platform expert, Kim has spearheaded marketing automation projects that unified customer data and enabled real-time, personalised cross-channel campaigns. He also played a key role in setting up Cheil’s global data center in India, boosting offshore R&D and global operational efficiency.
“The advertising landscape is at a pivotal shift,” Kim said. “As AI continues to redefine marketing, our future success sits at the intersection of human psychology and data-driven technology. My goal is to drive an AI-led transformation that goes beyond the surface, embedding innovation into the very fabric of our business functions. Alongside our incredible talent, I look forward to delivering dynamic, high-impact marketing solutions our clients expect in this new era.”
With data as fuel and AI as engine, Cheil SWA is betting its next chapter will be written in algorithms as much as ideas. Kim is now firmly in the driver’s seat.
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Brands
IICT partners with Gativedhi to bring studio production tools to students
New MoU lets students explore AI-driven production pipelines for AVGC-XR
MUMBAI: The Indian Institute of Creative Technologies (IICT) has teamed up with Gativedhi Technologies to give students a front-row seat to modern studio production. The collaboration will integrate Gativedhi’s AI-powered production intelligence platform, Shotrack, into academic programmes, letting students experience the workflow systems used by animation, VFX and gaming studios.
Under the MoU, faculty, students and researchers will get hands-on access to Shotrack through beta programmes, pilot deployments and academic evaluations. This will allow them to explore simulated production pipelines, understand asset management, track tasks and monitor schedules, essentially seeing how complex projects come together behind the scenes.
Shotrack is designed to tackle a key industry challenge: when multiple studios work on the same project, differing internal systems often create bottlenecks, slow approvals and complicate version control. The platform provides a unified production environment, enabling smoother collaboration across distributed teams while generating operational insights and predictive analytics to optimise crew allocation, forecast schedule risks and manage costs.
The collaboration also opens doors to Gativedhi’s wider ecosystem. Upcoming tools include StudioTrack, for studio operations management covering budgeting, recruitment and IT infrastructure, and WorkTrack, which measures workflow efficiency and team productivity across industries.
IICT plans to embed these tools into programmes covering animation pipelines, VFX workflows, gaming production and media project management. Students will also benefit from guest lectures, masterclasses, workshops, internships and research projects that connect academic learning with real-world studio practices.
IICT CEO Vishwas Deoskar, said the partnership provides “An environment where production pipeline tools can be explored, tested and refined while students gain insight into how large-scale productions are organised.”
Gativedhi Technologies founder & CEO Senthil Kumar added, “This collaboration introduces students to real-world studio management tools and helps us improve our platform with academic feedback.”
With Shotrack in classrooms, India’s future animators, VFX artists and gaming producers will get a taste of studio life long before they step into one.
