MAM
Ten Sports promotes hockey tournament on ground, on air
MUMBAI: After a lengthy quiet period, Ten Sports is all set to connect with viewers in a big way not just on air but also on ground.
The channel, which has exclusive telecast rights to the hockey’s premiere tournament, the Champions Trophy, is making a big play around the event to be held from 16-24 August in The Netherlands.
Before the tourney itself kicks off however, Ten is hoping to get fans into the groove and will pull at their patriotic heart strings from today onwards.
Coinciding with Independence Day which falls tomorrow, a series of promo’s My heart beats for India sees the players talking about their most emotional moments while playing for the country.
For instance, coach Rajinder Singh reminisces about his Olympic success in 1980, as well as his role in helping India to its only Bronze medal in the Champions Trophy in 1982. At the same time, he believes that as a coach, he might well better that performance at this edition of the event.
The current Indian skipper Dhanraj Pillay recollects great moments against Pakistan. For Dilip Tirkey, a man of few words, the heart breaking loss to Poland in the final group match of the 2000 Olympics remains etched in memory. Goalkeeper Devesh Chauhan talks about his brilliant performance against Pakistan in the semi final of the 2002 Asian Games and his stellar efforts in thwarting the great Sohail Abbas.
Ten Sports’ marketing manager Mohit Mehra said: “Apart from the on-air efforts, we have extended these to an on-ground promotion called Go India Go running in all the major metro’s. High traffic areas will be telecasting the matches on large screens. Specially designed Ten Sports bandanna’s with Go India Go branding will be given away to viewers along with other special offers.”
“The fact that the telecast times for the matches are at prime-time is a big help. Champions Trophy Hockey 2003 has received some excellent support from advertisers with Hero Honda stepping in as the presenting sponsor. Hutch, Toyota, HPCL, Asian Paints and Titan are the associate sponsors,” adds Mehra.
The channel has also coined nicknames for the players. Mehra said, “The objective of all our efforts has been to glamourise the sport and the players. As you know people react to characters and stars and we have tried to build up the hockey players as characters by using some facet of their playing skills. We feel that the nicknames we have used will help more people relate to them. The names really reflect the special quality of the players depending on their role. We feel that this might inspire youngsters to emulate them and have more people taking up the sport.”
For instance Chauhan has been designated “Spiderman” on account of his athleticism and agility to keep out the opposition. The team’s “Terminator” is Deepak Thakur. One of the best finishers in modern hockey once he gets into the “D” his conversion rate of moves into goals is as high. The “Leech” Viren Rasquinha is one of the unsung heroes of the team. His passes from the midfield and man marking skills make him one of the key players in the team. Pillay is the “Wizard”.
The “Speed Demon” Gagan Ajit Singh has the enviable ability to accelerate. Dilip Tirkey is nicknamed “The Rock” as his defence is rock solid. “Dragon” Jugraj Singh’s speciality is the drag flick which is one of most potent penalty corner conversion techniques.
Brands
Tessolve lands a semiconductor veteran to drive its next big push
Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, who started his career at ISRO and has spent 35 years building chips and companies, joins the Bengaluru-based firm as president and chief operating officer
BENGALURU: Tessolve has never been shy about its ambitions. The Bengaluru-based engineering services firm already counts 18 of the world’s top 20 semiconductor companies among its clients, employs more than 3,500 engineers across 12 countries, and last year pocketed a $150m investment from TPG. Now it has hired the executive it believes can turn those assets into something bigger. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, a 35-year semiconductor veteran who once built satellite payloads for ISRO and has since scaled engineering organisations across three continents, joins as president and chief operating officer, effective immediately.
THE MAN AND THE MANDATE
The appointment is, by any measure, a serious hire. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu comes to Tessolve after senior leadership stints at HCL Technologies, Altran and Wipro, where he managed large profit-and-loss portfolios and oversaw cross-regional teams. Over the course of his career, he has been instrumental in bringing more than 1,000 new products to market across the high-tech, energy and manufacturing verticals. Before the private sector claimed him, he began his working life as a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organisation, contributing to research and development in charge-coupled device technology and satellite payloads, a foundation that shaped everything that followed.
In his new role, he will lead Tessolve’s global growth strategy: expanding its engineering capabilities, deepening customer relationships and accelerating innovation across semiconductor and high-performance computing domains. The brief is broad, but the context is specific. Tessolve operates in the $550 billion global semiconductor market, and its recent moves, the acquisition of Germany’s Dream Chip Technologies and the TPG funding round, have sharpened both its reach and its expectations.
Srini Chinamilli, co-founder and chief executive of Tessolve, is characteristically direct about why Ravi Kumar Chirugudu was the choice:
“As we scale our global semiconductor and system engineering capabilities, Ravi’s appointment marks an important step forward. As global semiconductor demand continues to accelerate across industries, it is creating significant opportunities across the semiconductor lifecycle, from design, packaging, validation and systems integration. Ravi’s deep knowledge and leadership in this ecosystem brings the right mix of industry expertise, customer connect and execution capability, which will play a key role in strengthening our position as a trusted global engineering partner and reinforcing our market leadership.”
THE NEW ARRIVAL SPEAKS
Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, for his part, frames the move in terms of timing and culture, two factors that veteran executives tend to weigh as heavily as title or compensation:
“I am happy to join Tessolve at a time when the industry is rapidly evolving towards more complex, AI-driven systems. What stands out to me is its strong people-first culture and its commitment to bringing value to its customers. The strength of its global team, combined with its deep expertise in semiconductor innovation and next-generation product engineering, creates a solid foundation to build differentiated, scalable solutions. I look forward to working closely with the team to drive strategic growth and strengthen its role in shaping the global semiconductor ecosystem.”
The reference to AI-driven systems is not incidental. The semiconductor industry is in the midst of a structural reshaping, driven by the insatiable compute demands of artificial intelligence. For engineering services firms like Tessolve, which offers end-to-end capabilities from silicon design to packaged parts and invests in high-performance computing, high-speed interfaces, photonics and 5G, the moment is both an opportunity and a test. The company says it is well positioned to capture the next wave of industry growth. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu is now the person who has to prove it.
He came in from outer space, literally, and spent three decades learning how the semiconductor industry works from the inside out. Now Tessolve is betting that accumulated knowledge can help it cross the next frontier. In the $550 billion global chip market, the gap between ambition and execution is measured in engineering hours and leadership quality. Tessolve has just gone shopping for both.
