Peter Arnell, Chief Branding Officer and Gabriel Giordani, Group Director Products from VEON Ltd. visited the Suleman Dawood School of Business (SDSB), LUMS on October 10, 2017 and met faculty and students.
Mr. Arnell’s talk on ‘The magic of Branding’ was very well received and extremely inspiring for the session attendees. Mr. Arnell has created and established several world-famous brands such as PepsiCo, Samsung, Banana Republic, McDonald's, Home Depot, Pfizer, Donna Karan's DKNY line, Reebok etc.
An architect by profession, he studied art, architecture and architecture history at Columbia and Princeton. He worked for I.M. Pei as a studio assistant and later worked as a project architect for Michael Graves, working on Humana Corporation headquarters and Portland Public Service buildings. Mr. Arnell started his first company, Arnell Group in 1979, which evolved into a design, brand and product innovation firm, specialising in building unique and proprietary intellectual property and assets. He is also the founder of Intellectual Capital Investments (2011).
Mr. Arnell recently joined VEON Ltd. to re-engineer the brand and transition the company from mobile carrier to technology platform. Previously he was acting Chief Creative Officer at BlackBerry Limited, leading global brand and communications.
Speaking about his professional journey, which spans over 40 years, he said, “We should build a culture, not a brand. We are now shifting from branding to belonging where the experience and value of the brand will be handed over to the consumer.”
Mr. Arnell implored students to be open to learning, every day of their life. He also urged students know their responsibilities to create an impact with their ideas.
Gabriel Giordani is Vice President, Product at VEON Ltd., leading global digital product development, with a special focus on the VEON Ltd. platform. Prior to joining VEON Ltd., Gabriel developed consumer products and platforms at AOL, Microsoft and a host of technology start-ups big and small. Elaborating on ‘Digital product development’, Mr. Giordani also shared his experiences with keen MBA students.
Dr. Atif Saeed Chaudry, Assistant Professor, Finance and Director MBA Programme appreciated the speakers and requested them to mentor LUMS students. He said that the speakers have imparted knowledge that would complement the MBA courses by linking the classroom learnings with real life experiences. He also invited them to conduct workshops at LUMS.
