Brands
Vida and KKR team up for a three season electric partnership
MUMBAI: Cricket jerseys are getting an electric upgrade and this one comes with serious wattage. Vida, Hero Motocorp’s emerging electric mobility brand, has signed on as the title partner of the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), locking in a three-season association that places the EV maker front and centre on one of the IPL’s most recognisable kits. The deal marks a decisive push by Vida into mainstream sport as it looks to tap younger, aspiration-driven audiences.
The partnership pairs two brands pitching themselves as future-facing. On one side is KKR, a franchise known for its bold branding and on-field aggression; on the other, Vida, positioning itself as a challenger in India’s fast-evolving electric two-wheeler market. The common thread: performance, ambition and a pitch to a generation keen to move faster whether on the crease or the road.
Under the agreement, Vida becomes the front-of-jersey title sponsor for KKR for the upcoming season, with the association running for three years. Beyond branding, the partnership will roll out a slate of fan engagement initiatives through the season, spotlighting performances defined by speed, agility and leadership cues carefully aligned with Vida’s electric-first mobility narrative.
KKR CEO Venky Mysore said the franchise looks to partner with brands “shaping the future”, adding that Vida’s electric mobility ambitions fit neatly with the team’s forward-looking ethos. For Vida, the tie-up offers visibility at the intersection of sport, culture and technology, a space increasingly crowded but still powerful.
Hero Motocorp chief business officer for emerging mobility business unit Kausalya Nandakumar said the association mirrors the confidence and resilience of what brands often describe as a “new India”, one that is comfortable with change and willing to embrace more sustainable choices.
The deal underlines a broader trend, electric mobility brands moving beyond functional messaging to tap emotion, fandom and cultural relevance. Cricket, with its unmatched reach and ritualised loyalty, remains the fastest lane into that conversation.
As the season unfolds, Vida and KKR will both be chasing momentum, one on the scoreboard, the other on India’s roads hoping that a shared jersey can help power progress in more ways than one.
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.
