HCL Group Names Nikhil Soni Head of Brand and Marketing

The marketer behind the HCL Concerts platform will now look after brand work across sports, culture, learning and environment initiatives.

NextWise News Desk  |  October 9, 2026

Nikhil Soni has been appointed head of brand and marketing at HCL Group, according to a report published on October 9. He took on the role in July 2026, and his responsibilities now cover the group’s brand as well as its work in sports, culture, learning and the environment.

Soni is well known for his work on HCL Concerts, a classical music platform that he has been associated with since 2015. The report says the platform expanded from two cities to ten during that time. It now holds over 20 concerts and more than 60 online streams every year, with live audiences above 30,000 and online viewership of more than 1.2 million. The report also credits Soni with leading the launch and growth of the HCL Music app, which has crossed 200,000 installs.

His other major assignment has been in education. Since 2020, Soni has headed performance marketing and demand generation for Shiv Nadar University Chennai, running campaigns across search, social media, print, television and outdoor advertising. The report states that admissions revenue rose by 140 per cent over five admission cycles, while the number of applications tripled over six years.

Soni has spent 12 years in higher education and in media and entertainment. He joined HCL in August 2015 as a marketing manager and moved up through the ranks to assistant general manager. Before that, he began his career as a software engineer at HCLTech and later worked in banking and consulting, as well as in admissions marketing at the Sharda Group.

He has also been named among India’s Top 100 Digital Marketers by Paul Writer and Adobe Digi100. According to the report, he focuses on the cost of winning customers, conversion, retention and long-term brand value. Soni said he looks forward to building on the work already done and shaping the next phase of the HCL Group brand.

Why it matters: The wider brief shows that HCL Group sees its brand as more than a technology business, with arts, sports, education and the environment all part of how it presents itself to the public.