Manish Choksi joins Bizongo advisory board; Simplilearn, HERE, Signzy make top-level hires

Asian Paints vice chairman Manish Choksi has joined the advisory board of Mumbai based Smartpaddle Technology, the company that owns and operates the B2B marketplace Bizongo. Choksi, the company said in a statement on Monday, will offer advice on business functions such as digital vendor management, supply chain automation and supply chain financing.

Bizongo raised a $51 million Series C funding round in April this year. Investors in the company include Schroder Adveq, CDC Investment, AddVentures, Chiratae Ventures, B Capital Group, IFC and Accel.

The platform aims to expand to emerging markets in South East Asia such as Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam and start servicing the developed markets of US, Middle East, Europe. In parallel, the company is also focusing on creating a stronger portfolio of unbranded products that are not limited to packaging and extend into other segments, such as textiles and garments.

“With COVID-19 forcing businesses to relook at their supply chains, Bizongo continues to transform and automate global supply chains for unbranded goods. This is an exciting time to mentor the founders and work with the team at Bizongo as they build India’s full stack B2B platform,” Choksi said.

Bizongo claims to currently have more than 100 enterprise customers and 1000-plus manufacturing partners on its platform. It uses its proprietary digital platforms such as Procure Live and Partner Hub to simplify vendor management and supply chain for its business customers.

Simplilearn

Online learning and corporate training platform Simplilearn said on Tuesday it had added four senior executives to its leadership team as it seeks to scale its business in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

P V Viswanathan has joined the company as senior director product management and will manage the learner management software platform as well the platform tools focused on scaling Simplilearn’s business. Viswanathan earlier worked as a principal product manager with Walmart Labs.

The company has onboarded Jason Marcuson as director, partnership and alliance, to drive the US partnership outreach and engagement for all universities and industries. He will be part of Simplilearn Americas. Prior to Simplilearn, Marcuson was on the board of directors at TechPoint Foundation for Youth.

Gaurav Agrawal has joined the company as director, analytics and data Science. At Simplilearn, Agrawal will define the analytics vision, build and manage analytics tools and frameworks, and shape the direction of short and long-term business priorities with actionable data insights. Agrawal has earlier worked at companies such as Domino’s Pizza, IndiaMart, and Capillary Technologies.

Vivek Maheshwari has been onboarded as director, CRM. In his new role, Maheshwari will be responsible for delivering scalable and personalised communication to customers across the funnel and will drive the customer engagement and retention charter for the organisation. Prior to joining Simplilearn, Maheshwari was with Lifestyle International and Vodafone Idea.

“Edtech as a sector has witnessed some path breaking growth numbers in the last one year, and is only bound to go further. At Simplilearn, we are at a pivotal point in our growth journey as we align to cater to the evolving needs of the consumer and the tech industry,” Simplilearn founder and CEO Krishna Kumar said in the context of the new appoitments.

Simplilearn provides outcome-based online training across technologies and applications in data science, AI and machine learning, cloud computing, cyber security and other critical digital disciplines. Based in San Francisco and Bengaluru, the company claims to have enabled over 2 million professionals and 2,000 companies across 150 countries to get trained and acquire certifications.

HERE Technologies

Location data and technology platform HERE Technologies has appointed Jason Jameson as senior vice president and general manager for Asia Pacific. In his new role, Jameson will be responsible for identifying opportunities for customers, partners and developers across industries.  

Jameson replaces Stanimira Koleva who left HERE to pursue a new opportunity, the company said in a statement.

He joins HERE from IBM where he held various executive leadership roles over the past decade and most recently led their cloud business in the Asia Pacific region   

“As location becomes an increasingly vital component for enterprises across industries, the Asia Pacific market presents us with many untapped opportunities for us to explore and transform into revenue,” Jameson said.

Signzy

No-code AI platform Signzy has appointed Arghya Bhattacharya as vice president of partnerships and alliances. Bhattacharya will be based in Bengaluru and will be responsible for building strategic partnerships with consulting firms, system integrators, technology partners and fintechs, the company said in a statement on Tuesday.

Prior to Signzy, Bhattacharya was director for partner sales at Icertis for the India, Middle East and Africa markets. Before Icertis, he was director of alliances at Happiest Minds Technologies.

 “Arghya brings with him a wealth of experience and expertise in building and nurturing partnership alliances. I am truly delighted to welcome him and am confident that he will play an instrumental role in building new partnerships and strengthening existing ones at Signzy, and in realising our mission to be a globally-leading provider of a digital trust system,” Signzy co-founder Ankit Ratan said.

 Globally, Signzy has a partnership with Mastercard and offices in New York and Dubai to serve its customers around the world. The company’s AI-led digital new customer onboarding solutions are used to onboard thousands of customers every month by several banks, insurance companies and corporations in India and around the world. Its clientele includes Aditya Birla Sunlife AMC, BoB Financials, State Bank of India and ICICI Bank.