MMA’s Data Unplugged advances CX for all with AI; gathers 38 leaders for 12 power sessions

MMA Global India’s flagship event, Data Unplugged, returned with its 5th and most future-forward edition yet - bringing together 38 CX, marketing, and AI leaders across 12 high-impact sessions at The Leela Palace, Bengaluru. With a sharp focus on Advancing CX with AI, this year’s theme tackled how organizations can integrate intelligence, empathy, and real-time adaptability into customer journeys, transforming CX into a serious growth engine.

From groundbreaking keynote insights by Hindustan Unilever to inclusive CX solutions for the visually impaired, and from hyper-personalization at scale to rethinking CRM through a connected lens - Data Unplugged 2025 offered playbooks, provocations, and proof points for organizations serious about closing the capability gap in their CX and marketing strategies.

Rohit Dadwal, CEO, MMA Global APAC | Global Head of SMARTIES WW commented: “India is moving from AI adoption to AI acceleration. What stood out at Data Unplugged was the maturity of conversations - from vanity metrics to value creation, from buzzwords to business impact. As a market, India has the agility, the data depth, and the tech talent to lead CX innovation globally. Forums like this are essential to channel that potential - not just within marketing teams, but across the boardroom.”

Event highlights and session takeaways

• Welcome Address: AI-CX Flywheel - The Best Kept Secret
  Moneka Khurana, Country Head and Board Member, MMA Global India
  Moneka set the tone by decoding the AI-CX flywheel - a virtuous loop where insights from customer interactions fuel smarter experiences, creating exponential impact. Her call: stop treating CX as an outcome, and start building it as a capability.

• Inaugural Keynote: Advancing CX with AI
  Arun Neelakantan, Executive Director - Customer Development, Hindustan Unilever; MMA India Board Member
  Shared how HUL is embedding AI into every CX touchpoint - from in-store engagement to post-purchase delight - powered by data symmetry, channel fluidity, and org-wide alignment.

• CX for All: Building Inclusive Journeys with the Power of AI
  Siddharth Gupta (Britannia), Amar Jain (Mission Accessibility), Niraj Ruparel (WPP and GroupM India)
  Unveiled an AI-enabled retail experience designed for visually impaired users - a powerful testament to designing CX that leaves no consumer behind. A first in India.

• Using AI to transform CX and fuel growth: A VC and brand perspective
  Viswanathan V (Elevation Capital), Goodies Narayanan (Ex-APAC CMO, Coursera)
  Demystified AI hype with sharp frameworks for growth: focus on agility, not vanity metrics; invest in infrastructure before intelligence.

• Breaking silos: How marketing and CX collaboration drives business growth
  Rohit Bhasin and Yogesh Garg (Kotak Mahindra Bank), Moderator: Moneka Khurana
  Kotak’s cross-functional operating model shows how CX-led marketing can reduce friction, deepen personalization, and drive meaningful ROI when silos are smashed.

• The new CX stack: Personalisation, AI and the Zivame Lens
  Lavanya Pachisia (Zivame), Rohit Dadwal (MMA Global APAC)
  Discussed building trust-first personalization where AI elevates user relevance while respecting boundaries - especially in high-intimacy categories like lingerie.

Moneka Khurana, Country Head and Board Member, MMA Global India said: “AI in CX is no longer a competitive edge - it’s the new baseline. MMA research has shown that focusing on customer experience is the marketing strategy with the strongest evidence for delivering financial outcomes. But what’s often overlooked is the cultural alignment and tech orchestration required to make this real. Data Unplugged 2025 brought together the sharpest minds to decode not just what to do, but how to do it - across data, decisions, and delivery. I couldn’t be prouder of the diversity and depth in this year’s lineup.”

• Fixing the broken CX journey: Why AI is no longer optional!
  Gaurav Agrawal (Exotel)
  Highlighted the criticality of real-time AI interventions in CX - not as an enhancement, but as a necessity to plug churn and preserve customer lifetime value.

• AI-powered CX: Hyper-personalisation at scale
  Ashwin Chandrasekar (Third Wave Coffee), Namit Pandit (HUL), Shilpa Gupta (HomeLane), Taranjeet Kaur (Tata Consumer), Sameer Malik (Haleon); Moderator: Vyshak Venugopalan (Adobe)
  Revealed how brands are using AI + predictive analytics to create moment-based, real-time experiences across physical and digital journeys - without compromising consumer consent.

• Is agentification the key to smarter customer journeys?
  Avijit Mohapatra (Flipkart), Ashish Bajaj (Narayana Health), Shruthi Bopaiah (Axis Bank), Girish Ramachandra (Shopalyst), Raahul Seshadri (WebEngage); Moderator: Neeraj Pratap Sangani (Hansa Cequity)
  Explored the next frontier of conversational AI - agentification - where smart, autonomous interfaces mimic human interactions while optimizing outcomes.

• Unified customer view: Breaking silos with connected CRM (in partnership with Paytm Ads)
  Anshul Batra (Paytm Ads), Kalyani Seshadri (Tanishq), Nazia Murad Wagle (Aditya Birla Group), Supriya Rath (Lenovo), Sathish Krishnan (RedBus), Hitarth Saini (Freo); Moderator: Anand Parameswaran (Kantar)
  Delivered real-world use cases where CRM unification unlocked personalization at scale - with integrated touchpoints, customer lifetime visibility, and ROI-centric delivery.

• Optimizing the martech stack for CX maturity
  Priya Chakravarthy (BluSmart), Saurabh Aggarwal (Insybit), Varun Kulkarni (NoBroker), Gandharv Sachdeva (Hybrid); Moderator: Shivani Tiwari (AJIO)
  Urged brands to audit tech redundancies and align their martech ecosystems to measurable CX outcomes - treating tools not as trophies, but as transformers.

CX, AI, and what comes next…

With 38 powerhouse speakers, 12 deeply actionable sessions, and a unified call to advance customer obsession with AI, Data Unplugged 2025 was a signal that the industry is ready to shift from experimental to exponential when it comes to CX transformation. The conversations sparked in Bengaluru are bound to echo across boardrooms for months to come.