Abby Awards announces a Master Jury for creative Abby

By A Correspondent

The Abby Awards, that recognizes and rewards creative excellence, is poised to set new benchmarks on scale and innovation with the upcoming 2018 edition. The apex industry award has for the first time announced the formation of a Master Jury.

The Master Jury boasts of 15 award winning creative giants who have consented to be the filter for the creative standards of the Creative Abby.

The Master Jury comprises:

Prasoon Joshi, CEO of McCann Worldgroup India and Chairman (Asia Pacific)
Agnello Dias, Chairman and Co-Founder, Taproot
Amer Jaleel, Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, Mullen Lintas
Arun Iyer, Chairman & Chief Creative Officer at Lowe Lintas
Alok Nanda – Founder and CEO, Alok Nanda & Co. (Comms.) Pvt. Ltd.
Abhijit Avasthi, Founder Sideways Consulting’s
‎Bobby Pawar, Managing Director, Chief Creative Officer – ‎Publicis Worldwide
K. V. Sridhar – ‎Founder & Chief Creative Officer, Hyper Collective Creative Technologies
Nitesh Tiwari, Filmmaker and Ex CCO – Leo Burnett
Prashant Godbole – Founder, Ideas@work
Raj Kamble – Founder CCO, Famous innovations
Raj Deepak Das, Chief Creative Officer – ‎Leo Burnett
Santosh Padhi, CCO and co-founder, Taproot Dentsu
Senthil Kumar, Chief Creative Officer, J. Walter Thompson
Swati Bhattacharya, Chief Creative Officer, FCB Ulka

The Master Jury is entrusted with the task of first, as one body, screening all the entries received, across all the categories and verticals, to identify those worthy of being shortlisted. The same Master Jury will then deliberate on which of the shortlists is worthy of winning an Abby.

Speaking about the formation of a grand Master Jury for the iconic Abby 2018, Ajay Kakar, Chair of the Awards Governing Council, said: “We want the Abbys to be the gold standard, recognising creative excellence for brands. It is a fact that an award is as good or reputed as the Jury that judges it. So recognising this, we created a Master Jury, for Abby 2018. With the most credible jury that comprises of role models and thought leaders from the industry, who will lead the deliberation process.  The Master Jury will set standards for not only the quality of the work that wins at Abby 2018, but also the standards that will inspire the industry, hereafter.”

He further added: “Adjudged by such a versatile and visionary jury means that only the most creative campaigns will emerge victorious, making the winning of an Abby a career defining moment. We look forward to an inventive, pioneering and inspiring Abby Awards 2018.”

The 2018 edition of ABBY’s will also see the number of categories and sub-categories being rationalized, to ensure relevance and effectiveness. Added Kakar elaborated: “We recognise that digital is not a medium, but a technology that supports communication. Keeping this and such realities at the core, as against the past years, the categories and verticals have been brought down from 15 categories and 8 verticals i.e. 120 to 8 categories and 8 verticals ie 64.”

Another highlight is the reinstating of the Agency of the Year award. This year will see the announcement of the: Creative Agency of the Year, Design Specialist Agency of the Year, Digital Specialist Agency of the Year, Direct Specialist Agency of the Year, PR Specialist Agency of the Year, Branded Content & Entertainment Specialist Agency of the Year, Media Agency of the Year.