Jaskaran Singh Kapany quits as Paytm's CMO

Jaskaran Singh Kapany has quit as the CMO of Paytm, a large financial services company in India. A member of Campaign Asia-Pacific's Power List in 2020, he worked at Paytm for over six years as its marketing chief and was instrumental in helping the company's user base cross 350 million, closing a deal to become the sponsor for India's cricket team, putting the firm in the top 15 most valuable brands, according to Brand Z and helped build Paytm's offline business cross $50 billion in GMV. 

While Paytm was a big beneficiary of India's demonetisation program (its Paytm karo or pay by Paytm has become a byword for online/digital transactions) from the government five years ago, Kapany has ensured that the brand has continued to be relevant well after. He helped the brand launch a fresh marketing campaign to highlight the capability to pay using its app from any QR code. Kapany then followed this up in January 2020 with a campaign directed at retailers, aiming to market the ease of use and interoperability of its QR code.

Kapany has not disclosed his next move yet, but informed Campaign of his departure by text message. Paytm has elevated Abhinav Kumar, the company's VP of product marketing to replace him. Kumar joined Paytm in 2019 from travel portal Trivago, where he led the India business and became a brand ambassador for his own brand.

Kapany's departure comes at a time when Paytm has tried to balance being funded by a large Chinese investor, Alibaba, with growing nationalism in the country that has seen dozens of apps banned in India, even as its own founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma has been a torch bearer for a new wave of home grown tech ambitions and lauded the governments moves.