Ashish Rai has been promoted to Chief Executive Officer, Decorative Paints at JSW Paints. He was serving as the Chief Business Officer – Decorative Paints at JSW Paints from May 2024 to June 2025, leading the sales and marketing teams.
He announced the elevation on LinkedIn.
Prior to joining JSW, he spent over 18 years at Unilever in a range of senior leadership roles. Most recently, as Head of Distributive Trade Transformation from September 2023 to May 2024.
Before that, he served as Global Vice President – Distributive Trade and B2B E-commerce, from March 2020 to September 2023, where he led the distributive trade business across Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
He was also the Managing Director of Unilever Nepal from December 2017 to February 2020. As General Manager – South India from January 2015 to November 2017, he headed sales and customer development across six southern states of India.
Earlier, he led rural sales and distribution as Head – Rural Business and Alliances from December 2012 to December 2014.
In marketing, he held key international roles as Regional Marketing Manager – Pepsodent, South East Asia from March 2010 to November 2012 in Singapore, and as Global Brand Manager – Pepsodent and Signal from March 2008 to February 2010. He also served as Key Account Manager – Modern Trade from March 2006 to February 2008.
Before joining Unilever, he worked at Colgate-Palmolive India from 2002 to 2006, where he was Area Sales Manager – Rajasthan from April 2002 to June 2004 and later Account Manager – Modern Trade – West from July 2004 to February 2006.
