MAM
What you should know before pressing ‘I Agree’ button
NEW DELHI: 'Data is the new oil' is what we have been hearing for a long time now and observing how the marketing industry is relying on this pool of numbers to guess user behaviour, identify target consumers and customer-centric marketing campaigns. One mode of reaching out to prospective customers has been the use of programmatic advertising, using buying and selling of data using artificial intelligence.
While this gives the marketers and advertisers great power in hand to grow their business, it also raises pertinent questions about the pressing topic of consumer data protection, too.
In a virtual press meet, organised by Xaxis India, country head Bharat Khatri addressed the issue. While there are options for the consumers to protect their data and limit access they give to the apps and browsers, the lag remains in making them aware about these choices.
“To give you a quick example, you can use the settings option on your android device to opt-out of ad personalisation, which means stop sharing your advertising ID with any of the apps, or on a music streaming platform like Spotify, you can see and monitor all the data you are sharing with them,” Khatri said.
He added, “Yes, in a country like India, there is a lot that can be done to make the consumers aware of these options. There needs to be education around this.”
In a separate telephonic conversation with Indiantelevision.com, IdeateLabs MD Amit Tripathi also stated that data privacy is a big issue as digital grows. “Data is not very safe online. With every “I Agree” button you click, you are sharing lots of personal information with the platform. It makes sense from a business perspective, as to provide you with free services, they will have to get the advertisers’ money coming in.”
While all these digital platforms, the apps or browsers, give the users the option to opt-out of data sharing, limiting access to personal information, etc., is a cumbersome procedure. People need to be educated about this.
“I think there is a vast opportunity for entrepreneurs to work in this field and I believe that in future, not so distant, we will have actual training for how to protect your data online, or how to deal with cyber bullying. There are a lot of progressive schools that are already teaching the latter, and I think, in future, it is going to be even more rampant,” Tripathi commented.
He continued that only drafting policies might not be a solution as in a big country like India, it will take some time to get it implemented. “For example, even for setting a cybercrime cell, you need trained manpower, hackers to compete with hackers, people who understand data; and this force can’t be created overnight. We obviously will need to train people and set up a system.”
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.
