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Pinning down the zeitgeist: WPP plugs Pinterest trends into its planning machine

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NEW YORK: Trends used to take time. Now they arrive fully formed at breakfast and die by lunch. WPP Media has decided to stop chasing them manually and start piping them straight into the veins of its planning operation instead.

The media giant has struck a deal with Pinterest to embed Pinterest Trends directly into WPP Open, its proprietary planning platform. The integration makes WPP the first agency with bespoke API access to Pinterest’s trend data—essentially giving its planners and clients a cultural early-warning system that updates in real time.

“Culture moves fast, and trends can make or break a campaign,” says WPP Media executive vice president and global head of data and partnerships Amanda Grant. “The challenge isn’t just spotting what’s popular—it’s knowing what matters and moving at the speed of behaviour.”

Pinterest, where 500 million  users actively search for inspiration rather than scroll passively, has become something of a crystal ball for marketers. People pin wedding themes six months out, Halloween costumes in August, and Christmas gift ideas before the turkey’s cold. That forward-looking intent makes Pinterest’s data particularly valuable for brands trying to get ahead of the curve rather than jump on bandwagons already rolling downhill.

Through the new integration in Open’s Strategic Insights module, WPP teams can now access trends without leaving their planning console. No more manual research. No more educated guesses about whether “cottagecore” is peaking or “clean girl aesthetic” is yesterday’s news. The system serves up search volumes, seasonality patterns, and trend evolution data, filtered by demographics, categories, keywords and what Pinterest calls “moments”—those cultural inflection points when something goes from niche to mainstream.

The partnership reflects a broader industry shift. As cultural relevance increasingly depends on speed—and algorithms decide what gets seen—agencies are racing to automate the insights that previously required armies of junior planners trawling Reddit and TikTok. WPP is betting that hardwiring Pinterest’s signals into its planning workflow will help clients spot opportunities before competitors do, and avoid backing trends that are already fading.

“Today, cultural relevance is shaped by two forces: the trends that spark ideas and the creator voices that amplify them,” Grant notes. The Pinterest integration tackles the former; presumably, humans still handle the latter.

Whether this turns WPP’s planners into trend-spotting savants or simply gives them better excuses when campaigns flop remains to be seen. But in a world where “brat summer” can dominate global marketing discourse for three months before vanishing entirely, having Pinterest whispering in your ear certainly beats guessing. After all, if you’re going to jump on a bandwagon, you might as well know which direction it’s heading—and how long before it crashes.

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Delhivery chairman Deepak Kapoor, independent director Saugata Gupta quit board

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Gurugram: Delhivery’s boardroom is being reset. Deepak Kapoor, chairman and independent director, has resigned with effect from April 1 as part of a planned board reconstitution, the logistics company said in an exchange filing. Saugata Gupta, managing director and chief executive of FMCG major Marico and an independent director on Delhivery’s board, has also stepped down.

Kapoor exits after an eight-year stint that included steering the company through its 2022 stock-market debut, a period that saw Delhivery transform from a venture-backed upstart into one of India’s most visible logistics platforms. Gupta, who joined the board in 2021, departs alongside him, marking a simultaneous clearing of two senior independent seats.

“Deepak and Saugata have been instrumental in our process of recognising the need for and enabling the reconstitution of the board of directors in line with our ambitious next phase of growth,” said Sahil Barua, managing director and chief executive, Delhivery. The statement frames the exits less as departures and more as deliberate succession, a boardroom shuffle timed to the company’s evolving scale and strategy.

The resignations arrive amid broader governance recalibration. In 2025, Delhivery appointed Emcure Pharmaceuticals whole-time director Namita Thapar, PB Fintech founder and chairman Yashish Dahiya, and IIM Bangalore faculty member Padmini Srinivasan as independent directors, signalling a tilt towards consumer, fintech and academic expertise at the board level.

Kapoor’s tenure spanned Delhivery’s most defining years, rapid network expansion, public listing and the push towards profitability in a bruising logistics market. Gupta’s presence brought FMCG and brand-scale perspective during a period when ecommerce volumes and last-mile delivery economics were being rewritten.

The twin exits, effective from the new financial year, underscore a familiar corporate rhythm: founders consolidate, veterans rotate out, and fresh voices are ushered in to script the next chapter. In India’s hyper-competitive logistics race, even the boardroom does not stand still.

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Meta appoints Anuvrat Rao as APAC head of commerce partnerships

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SINGAPORE: Anuvrat Rao has taken charge as APAC  head of commerce and signals partnerships at Meta, steering monetisation deals across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp from Singapore. The former Google executive, known for launching Google Assistant, PWAs, AMP and Firebase across Asia-Pacific, steps into the role after a high-growth stint as chief business officer at Locofy.ai.

At Locofy.ai, Rao helped convert a three-year free beta into a paid engine, clocking 1,000 subscribers and 15 enterprise clients within ten days of launch in September 2024. The low-code startup, backed by Accel and top tech founders, is famed for turning designs into production-ready code using proprietary large design models.

Before that, Rao founded generative AI venture 1Bstories, which was acquired by creative AI platform Laetro in mid-2024, where he briefly served as managing director for APAC. Alongside operating roles, he has been an active investor and advisor since 2020, backing startups such as BotMD, Muxy, Creator plus, Intellect, Sealed and CricFlex through a creator-economy-led thesis.

Rao spent over eight years at Google, holding senior partnership roles across search, assistant, chrome, web and YouTube in APAC, and earlier cut his teeth in strategy consulting at OC&C in London and investment finance at W. P. Carey in Europe and the US.

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Brnd.me enters Europe as haircare brands power global expansion

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Bengaluru:  Brnd.me, the global consumer brands company formerly known as Mensa Brands, has entered the European market following strong momentum across the Middle East, the United States and Canada.

The company has launched across the UK, Germany, France and Spain, with plans to expand into Italy, the Netherlands and Poland over the next year. The push is being led by its haircare and aromatherapy brands, Botanic Hearth and Majestic Pure, marking Brnd.me’s first structured expansion into Europe.

The European beauty market represents a total addressable opportunity of over $4 billion across haircare and aromatherapy, supported by high digital adoption and demand for accessible, performance-led products.

Brnd.me’s hair care and aromatherapy business currently operates at an annual run rate of around $6 million, with Botanic Hearth and Majestic Pure delivering roughly 10 per cent month-on-month growth, driven by expansion and rising repeat demand.

To support regional growth, the company has appointed a general manager based in Germany and is evaluating investments in warehousing and local team expansion.

Early traction has been strong. Within weeks of launch, Botanic Hearth’s rosemary hair oil ranked among the top five hair oils in Germany, signalling strong consumer pull in a competitive market.

Brnd.me founder and chief executive officer Ananth Narayanan, said Europe represents the next phase of the company’s international strategy. He added that the European business is expected to scale to a $10 million annual run rate by the end of 2026, with long-term ambitions to reach $60 million over the next six years.

The company’s Europe strategy centres on digital-first distribution, repeat demand and TikTok-led discovery, alongside direct-to-consumer expansion to strengthen brand equity and margins.

The move also aligns with growing EU–India trade engagement, supporting long-term sourcing and cross-border supply chains.

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