Ralph de Sousa elected President of Goa Chamber of Commerce & Industry 2021-23
Ralph de Sousa has been elected President of Goa Chamber of Commerce and Industry for the term 2021-23. His nomination was unopposed. De Sousa, a hotelier and senior travel and tourism entrepreneur has been serving on various leadership positions at GCCI for nearly two decades. He has also headed CII Goa Council and Travel and Tourism Association of Goa (TTAG) in the past. De Sousa will take over from Manoj Caculo, whose term as President of GCCI ends this June. De Sousa heads the De Souza Group of Companies, which started their own hotel, Aldeia Santa Rita in Candolim, in the year 1991. In 1992, the de Souza Group diversified into travel and tour operations, with ‘Trans Orient Holidays Pvt. Ltd.’ located at Panjim. In 1994, ‘Santiago Resorts’, a 75 room resort was launched. This resort located in Calangute, was the first resort in Goa to offer an “All Inclusive” holiday plan to its customers, a trend that has widely caught on ever since.
In 1997, a 135 room 4 star resort ‘Sun Village’ was launched at Baga, Arpora, followed by a 55 rooms resort ‘The Horizon’, at Calangute.The De Sousa Group of Hotels owns several hotels along the North Goa coastal belt
Piyush Pandey is now Chairman, Global Creative at Ogilvy
WPP’s creative agency Ogilvy has elevated Piyush Pandey to the position of chairman, global creative. He will continue to serve as the chairman of Ogilvy India. Pandey is the winner of over 400 ad awards from all over the world. Under Pandey, Oglivy & Mather became the third largest advertising agency in India. In 1989, he moved to the creative department in O&M, became the Creative Director at Ogilvy, Mumbai in 1992 and rose to become the National Creative Director, O & M, India by 1994. The following year, he was nominated to the Board of Directors. Under his leadership, O&M has succeeded in retaining its well-acknowledged leadership position in Indian advertising for 8 years in succession. In 2004, he was appointed Executive Chairman for Ogilvy, India & South Asia. Pandey redefined Indian advertising by curing its colonial hangover and reaching out to the 1 billion strong Indian masses, by speaking to them in their own language. Within the country, he is acknowledged as an industry leader. He was voted ‘Asia’s Creative Person of the Year’ at the Media Asia Awards 2002. Piyush Pandey is the only Indian to have won a double Gold at Cannes and a triple Grand Prize at London International Awards.
Harish Rao appointed Art Outsourcing Manager for Sony Interactive Entertainment
Harish Rao has been appointed Art Outsourcing Manager for Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE), the maker of PlayStation. Throughout his career, Harish has supervised development, production, and localization teams across multiple publishers, featuring multi-million-dollar budget video game properties. Before joining Sony Interactive Entertainment, he has collaborated with numerous companies, including Blizzard Entertainment, 20th Century Fox, The Walt Disney Company, and Electronic Arts. He has produced a distinguished array of groundbreaking games and interactive content for international release such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds, Simpsons, and Aliens vs Predator.
Harish’s well-developed background in talent recruitment, milestone supervision, and tool and standard implementation has assisted in SIE’s reputation for greatness in gaming. Harish will play an integral role in helping to grow the new SIE Malaysia studio, the first of its kind in South East Asia
Adv Rajiv Shinkre pens book on the ‘golden era’ songs of Bollywood
Margao based lawyer Rajiv Mukund Shinkre has penned a book ‘Yaad Na Jaye Beete Geeton Ki’ on the famous songs from the golden era (1950s-70s) of Bollywood.
“In this book, I have described the musical strengths and other nuances of 106 songs. I have also provided details such as the lyrics, year, name of the film, music director, songwriter, singer, director of the film, and actor who performed in the film,” he says
Prof Angshuman Sarkar leads breakthrough discovery in treatment of breast cancer
Prof. Angshuman Sarkar, Associate Professor, Department of Biological Sciences at BITS Pilani, K K Birla Goa Campus and his team have investigated a novel mode of action of an already established drug used for the treatment of malaria named ‘Quinacrine’ for the treatment of human breast cancer.
Earlier this team had proved the repurposing of this drug in treating human lung cancer, too
