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Tag: Housing.com

  • Housing.com ups Jason Kothari as CEO

    Housing.com ups Jason Kothari as CEO

    MUMBAI: After much speculation over who would replace Rahul Yadav as the CEO of Housing.com, after his controversial exit earlier this year, the company has found one of its own to fill up the position. 

     

    Housing.com has named Jason Kothari as the new CEO. Kothari joined the company as chief business officer in August this year.

     

    The company’s board unanimously appointed him to the new post on Thursday.

     

    “Housing.com is one of those rare companies that have the potential to impact millions of people in their journey of buying, selling and renting homes. I am honoured that the Board has entrusted me with the responsibility of leading this dynamic company. We have built a world-class product and highly talented team, and it’s now time to rapidly progress towards our mission to build a world-class company,” said Kothari.

     

    Prior to joining Housing.com, Kothari was Valiant Entertainment co-founder and CEO, where he led the successful acquisition and turnaround of former $65 million unit of video game company Acclaim Entertainment, which owns and controls a library of popular entertainment characters, resulting in a 50x company value increase and global media recognition calling the company “Marvel 2.0.”

     

    Since August, Kothari has played an instrumental role on a number of key initiatives, including establishing a strong senior management team for the company by hiring chief financial officer Mani Rangarajan, general counsel Nandini Mehta, and the recently appointed CMO Nikhil Rungta.

  • Reliance Jio’s Nikhil Rungta joins Housing.com as CMO

    Reliance Jio’s Nikhil Rungta joins Housing.com as CMO

    MUMBAI: Reliance Jio senior vice president – marketing Nikhil Rungta as joined real estate giant Housing.com as chief marketing officer.

     

    Rungta replaces Pratik Seal, who resigned from his post in September this year.

     

    Prior to Reliance Jio, Rungta served as the CMO for Google in India for four years. He also played key business leadership roles at start-ups like Yebhi and Yatra.com.

     

    Housing.com chief business officer Jason Kothari said, “Nikhil is one of India’s leading marketers who has achieved remarkable success during his career. For the last two decades, he has worked in leadership roles across sales, marketing and e-commerce with both multinationals and start-ups. He has a deep understanding of the Indian consumer market and has used a mix of traditional marketing and digital media to grow world-class businesses and brands from the ground up. His rich experience will be a valuable addition to Housing.com’s growth plans and senior management team. We are very excited to have him on board with us.”

     

    Appreciating Housing.com’s disruptive approach to the market, Rungta said, “Housing, like Apple, has a great mix of technology and design thinking, their UI and UX is world class. They are making the home buying decision much easier for customers. The company has all the ingredients to become the next unicorn from India, and I am really excited to be a part of this journey with Housing. I would like to quote Travis Kalanick – CEO of Uber – ‘There are certain things in life where you have to go for it – just for the sheer adventure of it, and also for the potential.”

  • Housing.com sweeps five awards for ‘Look Up’ campaign

    Housing.com sweeps five awards for ‘Look Up’ campaign

    MUMBAI: Housing.com bagged five awards at the National Award for Marketing Excellence hosted by CMO Asia. It won in five key categories including ‘Brand Excellence in e-commerce and Internet Business Sector,’ ‘Emerging Brand Award’ and ‘Best New Brand, Product and Service Launch.’

     

    Recognizing the success for Housing.com’s marketing campaign ‘Look Up,’ the company was also awarded ‘Marketing Campaign of the Year’ and ‘Best Use of Social Media.’

     

    National Award for Marketing Excellence recognises organisations and marketers who have achieved extraordinary success for innovative and effective marketing practices. The platform awards marketers who have pushed their brands to measured success through sound and innovative marketing strategies.

     

    Housing.com chief marketing officer Pratik Seal said, “We are thrilled with the accolades and recognition Housing.com’s ambitious ‘Look Up’ campaign has received. The team zealously worked hard to not only push limits in terms of ideation but also executing this mammoth campaign. CMO Asia Awards is known to recognize excellence in marketing; it is a matter of great pride that our first brand campaign has been well received by the marketing fraternity.”

  • Housing.com fires CEO Rahul Yadav

    Housing.com fires CEO Rahul Yadav

    MUMBAI: Mumbai based online realty platform, Housing.com has released its CEO Rahul Yadav, with immediate effect, after a regular board meeting, held earlier on 1 July. Yadav who is also the co-founder of the company, will no longer be an employee of Housing.com and be associated with the company in any manner, going forward.

     

    The Housing board, unanimously agreed to bring Yadav’s tenure to a close, with reference to his behaviour towards investors, ecosystem and the media. The board believed that his behaviour is not befitting of a CEO and is detrimental to the company, known for its innovative approach to product development, market expansion and brand building.

     

    While the search for an interim CEO is underway, a transition plan has been put in place. The current senior executives of Housing.com will continue to run the operations on a daily basis, and ensure its continued smooth functioning. The board and the operating committee will remain closely involved with all key decisions.   

     

    Through an official statement the company said. “The Housing.com board, investors, management team and employees are keen to see Housing maximise its huge potential in India and beyond, as well as run in professional and world class manner. This is part of our larger commitment to India and the start-up ecosystem, which together remains unaffected and as strong as ever.”  

  • Mindshare bags e-commerce & digital biz worth Rs 700+ crore in 2015

    Mindshare bags e-commerce & digital biz worth Rs 700+ crore in 2015

    MUMBAI: GroupM’s Mindshare India has won several new accounts in the first four months of 2015, predominantly in the ecommerce and digital industries.

     

    The account wins amount to over Rs 700 crore in new business for the agency. The new accounts include the digital mandate for Snapdeal, media mandate for PayU, Saavn, Practo, Housing.com, NewsHunt, Novi Digital Entertainment and TTK Skore to name a few.

     

    Saavn co-founder and executive chairman Paramdeep Singh said, “As a category leader in the music streaming space, Saavn was looking for a befitting partner, who could leverage learnings from their vast portfolio of brands and combine proprietary tools that can help optimize media spends. The Mindshare team has exceptional experience in strategic and dynamic planning which is the need of the hour and we believe this association will help Saavn achieve our business ambitions.”

     

    PayU CEO Nitin Gupta said, “In Mindshare we find a partner that not only understands the emerging digital economy in India, but has the insights, expertise and commitment to help us become a world class brand.”

     

    Speaking on the new account wins, Mindshare South Asia CEO Prasanth Kumar, who took on the mantle in March this year, added, “We begin 2015 on a very promising note as Mindshare consolidates its leadership position in the market by adding several blue-chip clients especially in the ecommerce and digital industry. We are channelizing our services and talent towards frameworks and tools that include adaptive and real- time marketing, giving our clients the edge in an ever evolving media market- The Loop at Mindshare is one such example. Mindshare also includes a full service digital and social media agency to ensure seamless planning across all media for brand campaigns.”

  • Housing.com CEO Rahul Yadav apologises; withdraws resignation

    Housing.com CEO Rahul Yadav apologises; withdraws resignation

    MUMBAI: It was on Tuesday morning that the news of Housing.com CEO Rahul Yadav resignation started making rounds. The reports had excerpts from the resignation letter written by the 26-year-old CEO on 30 April to the board members and investors, which denigrated their “intellectual capability.”

     

    The letter said, “I don’t think you guys are intellectually capable enough to have any sensible discussion anymore. This is something, which I not just believe but can prove on your faces also.”

     

    If media reports are to be believed, the investors of Housing were considering removal of Yadav due to concerns over strategy and his conduct.

     

    The board met later in the day to discuss the resignation and also chart a new plan for the newly launched company. During the meeting, the Housing.com board reconstituted to include all the main shareholder representatives. Post the meeting, through an official statement, Housing.com said, “After some good conversations the board has reaffirmed its faith in Rahul Yadav’s vision at Housing.”

     

    Yadav, who has now withdrawn his resignation, said, “After some frank and healthy discussions with the board I have agreed to withdraw my resignation and I apologise for my unacceptable comments about the board members. I look forward to staying on at Housing as CEO and building an even greater company, while working in full harmony with the board.”

  • Pratik Seal quits Star India, joins Housing.com

    Pratik Seal quits Star India, joins Housing.com

    MUMBAI: It was in December 2013 when Star India management got on board a business head to bring alive its ‘dead’ general entertainment channel (GEC), Star Utsav.

    The channel launched in 2004, saw for the first time, a business head in Pratik Seal (former Life OK marketing head) in December 2013. However, the stint didn’t last for long as Seal decided to move on and join an e-commerce start-up, Housing.com, as chief marketing officer (CMO).

    When contacted, Seal confirmed the news to indiantelevision.com. “It’s been two months since I joined the new company.”

    Replacing him is former Star India vice president Jyotsna Viriyala, who has been elevated to the business head of the channel. She has over 15 years of work experience spanning advertising, marketing and broadcast in the areas of media planning and buying, research, marketing, business strategy, operations and general management.

    When asked about his decision of joining an e-commerce space, Seal answered, “I hail from a marketing background. Be it Micromax where I helped set up the brand or jumping into Life OK which was again a start-up channel and now an e-commerce start-up. I like to build brands right from the scratch.”

    His agenda for Housing.com is to be the number one in the e-commerce and m-commerce space in the next year and a half and then expand it further to take it to the next level.

    Armed with 14 years of experience, he started his career in 1998 as an account executive with Basic4 Advertising. After spending two years with the company, he moved to Ties2Family.com as assistant manager, marketing and then to FCB Ulka as senior account executive.

    After spending about two years with the agency, Seal joined Lowe as senior brand services manager and within three years, went on to become senior brand services director.

    Viriyala, a student from Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad (MICA), has worked in companies like Mindshare Fulcrum, JWT and Traveljini.com for the span of six years. She then moved to Star News as associate vice-president for the duration of two years. Her last stint before joining Star Utsav was as vice-president of Star India.