MxMIndia

Category: Ad Agencies

  • Prior to FoxyMoron, he was leading a portfolio of key accounts at Leo Burnett Orchard

    Foxy Moron appoints Karthik Hariharan to lead Bangalore office

    By A Correspondent

     

    FoxyMoron has roped in Karthik Hariharan to spearhead its South division based in Bengaluru. Prior to FoxyMoron, Hariharanwas leading a portfolio of key accounts at Leo Burnett Orchard for over two years.

     

    Commenting on the appointment, Suveer Bajaj, Co-founder, FoxyMoron said: “We are excited to welcome Karthik to head our business in the South. Having worked in leadership roles across various integrated business lines, Karthik’s skill and experience will be a perfect fit to the FoxyMoron repertoire. Karthik’s solid understanding on how brands are built will now translate beautifully on digital, specially complimenting the nature of our business.

     

     

  • Sawhney is tasked with creating a vibrant new culture that is conducive to producing great advertising and communication

    Triton Communications appoints Ashutosh Sawhney as CEO

    By A Correspondent

     

    Ashutosh Sawhney

    Triton Communications has announced the appointment of Ashutosh Sawhney as CEO of its operations across India.

     

    As part of his new role, Sawhney will focus on strengthening Triton’s value proposition to its clients, expand the business, collaborate with new clients and oversee the agency’s teams across offices in Mumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad and Bangalore. The CEO is tasked with creating a vibrant new culture that is conducive to producing great advertising and communication.

     

    Said Munawar Syed, Co-founder of Triton: “We are confident that Ashutosh will provide the kind of leadership that nurtures and builds on the spirit of Triton, while fast-tracking the agency to meet  the new challenges of consumer-led marketing and integrated strategies that are driving brands today.  He brings with him rich experience in creative thinking and brand building, and will therefore be well placed to contribute meaningfully to our client’s marketing needs.”

     

    Commenting with his characteristic candour, Co-founder Ali Merchant said: “Ashutosh possesses the zest, knowledge and creativity to lead Triton’s communications business. He is young and understands the market dynamics of this challenging industry. We wish him the very best and are certain that under his leadership Triton Communications will continue to contribute significantly to our clients’ business, and continue to create the kind of path-breaking work that has been Triton’s legacy for the past 26 years.”

     

     

  • Happy mcgarrybowen is mandated with redesigning the brand’s logo, along with creating a comprehensive visual identity guidebook

    Dream11 partners with Happy mcgarrybowen to unveil new brand identity

    By A Correspondent

     

    Happy mcgarrybowen has been roped in by Dream11 to create its new brand identity.

     

    Commenting on the rebranding exercise, Vikrant Mudaliar, CMO, Dream11 said: “We found Happy mcgarrybowen’s design strategy true to our brand’s ethos, and their experienced team came with a dynamic & youthful vibe – everything that we wanted to take our brand identity to the next

     

    Added Praveen Das, MD, Happy mcgarrybowen said: “We have a talented, seasoned and specialised design team that has been creating waves for quite a few clients in the recent past. We are very happy to put our best foot forward for Dream11 and we look forward to taking the brand places in the coming months.”

     

     

  • CEO South Asia Prasanth Kumar 'PK' to also head MENA & Africa. Amrita Randhawa is CEO – APAC

    Mindshare elevates PK, Amrita Randhawa

     

    By A Correspondent

     

    Mindshare, the global media agency network from WPP’s GroupM stable, has today announced two major leadership changes.

     

    Amrita Randhawa is promoted to Asia Pacific CEO. Randhawa, who was previously the CEO for Mindshare Greater China will remain based in Shanghai, where she will continue to manage Mindshare China as its Executive Chairperson, in addition to her overall Asia Pacific duties.Prasanth Kumar (PK) is promoted to the position of CEO for MENA and Africa in addition to his current role as the CEO for South Asia. It may be recalled that Ravi Rao, earlier CEO South Asia, held the role of CEO, Mindshare MENA. Although we do not have any official word on this, according to the information we’ve received, Rao will take charge of a new cluster.

     

    Randhawa has been with the agency for over 12 years working across elhi, Mumbai, Beijing, Shanghai and APAC Regional office in Singapore. During her time, as Greater China CEO she oversaw the elevation of the agency to its current dominant position in China topping every league in the market including the RECMA qualitative and quantitative leagues, R3 AgencyScope and making the China office the global lead contributor to Mindshare’s new business wins. She has also since taking on the remit of Greater China last year worked with the leadership in both Taiwan and Hong Kong to transform both markets. Randhawa’s leadership has been recognized at several forums including the inaugural Women Leading Change Awards, Campaign 40 under 40, Ad Age China’s Women to Watch and Campaign’s Greater China Agency Leader of the Year.

     

    In her new role she will focus on the agency’s product, especially delivering the balance of brand and demand services for marketers and ensuring that Mindshare adapts and evolves in line with client’s needs first and not agency agendas.

     

    Commenting on the appointment Randhawa said: “We often say Mindshare has an Asian heart with our first office being in Taiwan. Asia is the star of our network and I take this responsibility with an incredible sense of humility. Sitting at the crossroads of data, content, technology and analytics, this is the time for the media agency. Working with the incredible leadership team we have in each of the APAC clusters especially in Himanshu, Katie and PK, our focus will be to ensure that Mindshare is ahead of the pack and charts the path for what is possible for media agencies today and tomorrow. The media landscape is changing in every corner of Asia at an incredible speed and working with the amazing breadth of talent we have in this region to create our future is a phenomenal opportunity.”

     

    PK has been CEO for South Asia, where he oversaw rapid expansion in the market bringing the agency to a dominant position according to RECMA.  During his time as the Mindshare India CEO he developed a record for not just the most number of new business wins by a single market, but also a tradition of external accolades, which included such highlights as a Glass Lion at Canes and an average of over 250 external awards per year.

     

    Commenting on his appointment, PK said: “This recognition in the context of the strong talent profile we have built in the purple family means a lot to me as it reflects our commitment to focus, serve and collaborate with our clients fueling their business growth. Marketing is morphing and so are we in terms of how we think, act and behave for our clients and their business outcomes. This expanded role gives me the opportunity to widen my perspectives and cross-pollinate our learning and initiatives for smarter, faster, better practices for our clients and our purple talent. I am thrilled and excited to be working with the new markets – Middle East and Africa, as these markets along with India and South Asia are probably the fastest growing economies on the planet. I am very proud and confident of my team. Together we will make the purple flag fly newer heights!”

     

    Randhawa and PK in their new role will continue to work with Ashutosh Srivastava, the Executive Chairperson & CEO for Growth Markets, comprising of APAC, MENA, Africa & Russia/CIS.’

     

    Commenting on the appointments, Srivastava said, “Amrita and PK represent the very best of Mindshare. They have both been transformative in their leadership approach to two of our biggest markets and have made Mindshare the dominant force it is today. These two represent the future of Mindshare for some of our most important markets globally. I look forward to them continuing to transform Mindshare’s vast network of offices in this region to stay relevant and highly valued business partners to their clients.

     

    Both roles are effective immediately.

     

     

  • The premise: There are prevalent biases against women, senior individuals, differently-abled individuals when it comes to athleticism and the film highlights these biases well

    DDB Mudra creates war cry for MuscleBlaze

    By A Correspondent

     

    Leveraging insights from the lives of fitness and sports enthusiasts, MuscleBlaze is unveiled a new digital campaign – ‘Ziddi Hoon Main’ created by the DDB Mudra Group.

     

    Commenting on the brand, Sameer Maheshwari, CEO & Founder, Muscleblaze, said: “Muscleblaze is committed to connect and communicate meaningfully with fitness enthusiasts. We believe “Zidd” as a concept will strike an instant chord with fitness consumers and strengthen Muscleblaze position as a leading sports nutrition brand in India.”

     

    Speaking on the campaign, Brijesh Jacob, Chief Creative Technologist, DDB Mudra Group, said: “The brand team had just come off a huge hit with Tum Nahin Samjhoge. The benchmark had been set. But more importantly we felt that it was time to lay down a platform that can be ownable and on which we could build the brand. Zidd, is that platform and we believe is easily extendable to both internal as well as external audiences.”

  • The tool will be used for all Dentsu Aegis Network India clients. The tool is a collaboration across the TV and Digital brands under the Network’s umbrella in India

    Dentsu unveils video planning and insights tool, DAN Prism

    By A Correspondent

     

    Dentsu India has announced the launch of DAN Prism, a unique video planning and insights tool that provides a single audience view across television and digital.

     

    DAN Prism overlays the consumption pattern of the digital consumers on Facebook, YouTube and programmatic video with BARC to provide rich audience insights. These insights are then used for planning and activation through a single reach curve across all media platforms in a matter of minutes using a series of Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms.

     

    Gautam Mehra

    Speaking on the launch, Gautam Mehra, Chief Data Officer – Dentsu Aegis Network South Asia said: “In the ever-changing media landscape, we are experiencing a golden age of Video Consumption in India with fantastic content and platforms. The proliferation of smart devices is changing the way consumers consume content. Today India boasts of 800+ TV channels watched by 780 million Indians. There are nearly 100 million subscribers to OTT platforms and nearly 260 million online video watchers in the country. Evidently, multi-screening has become a part of the natural video consumption habit of the average Indian. One of Dentsu Aegis’ core objectives today is to deliver a proprietary, audience-first approach to video planning that maximizes client investment across TV and digital video. The idea here is always to harness the true power of data. DAN Prism is just one more step in that direction.”

     

    Rajni Menon

    Added Rajni Menon, CEO, Carat India: “The TV viewing landscape of the country is swiftly changing owing to the mushrooming of a large number of OTT players, better connectivity and increased smart-phone penetration. As a country, we are now spending a lot more time watching video content. A large part of this is done on the mobile and on tablets. DAN Prism serves to be a powerful tool that reflects people’s behaviours today, enabled by convergence.”

     

     

  • Hungry to have a presence in India, M&C Saatchi buys Vivek Suchanti’s stake in agency

    Scarecrow now a part of M&C Saatchi

     

    By A Correspondent

     

    We were all set to do the trek to Ballard Estate in South Mumbai. As also huff and puff up to the second floor office for a roundtable and a revelation. Except that the lure of an exclusive in a pink major killed the idea of the press meet-up.

     

    L to R: Raghu Bhat, Arunava Sengupta and Manish Bhatt

    Guess at the lunch, the rest of the media were to be served the crumbs, while the meat was handed over to the bigger fish. Sigh.

     

    Scarecrow, the eight-plus-year-old independent agency owned by Vivek Suchanti and Manish Bhatt, Raghu Bhat and Arunava Sengupta, has sold majority stake to M&C Saatchi. A global ad network set up by the founders of Saatchi & Saatchi, M&C Saatchi, has had a failed existence in India thus far. It will use the Scarecrow buy as a means to exert its influence in India.

     

    Vivek Suchanti

    With this transaction – much below the Rs 100 crore tag that has reported in the paper in honour of which Scarecrow compromised its relations with the rest of the press, M&C Saatchi has bought the majority 51 per cent stake that Suchanti owned. According to the info we have, there will be a gradual buy over five-six years of the 16.33% stake that Sengupta, Bhat and Bhatt will own. For now, the trio do not get even the crumbs, but they’ll get it with time.

     

    Scarecrow, as an agency, has been doing reasonably well with an impressive clients roster. It has done reasonably well on the awards circuit, though it boycotted Goafest 2018 reportedly because (Manish) Bhatt was upset on not being invited to be part of the Master Jury for the Creative Awards.

     

    So will M&C Saatchi truck with Scarecrow work? Yes, it should, say observers. Even though the 23-year-old agency formed by Jeremy Sinclair (Chairman), Bill Muirhead, David Kershaw (Chief Executive) and the brothers Maurice and Charles Saatchi has floundered in the country. Its buy of Delhi-based February in 2014 and the setting of the mobile arm have not achieved much. In 2015, it sold its digital and direct business to Pi Communcations.

     

    The Scarecrow co-founders Bhat, Bhatt & Sengupta are known to have the drive and have produced advertising that has been memorable.

     

    We’ll wait to see what happens next. We can sure it’ll be handed over first to that pink paper.

     

     

  • Saransh Agarwal is being elevated to lead content strategy & business for Flux and will report to Varun Duggirala, Content Chief @The Glitch

    Glitch goes content-heavy with the launch of Flux@The Glitch

    By A Correspondent

     

    Glitch has announced the launch of Flux@The Glitch, a specialised content division. Saransh Agarwal has been elevated to lead content strategy and business for Flux and will report to Varun Duggirala, Content Chief @The Glitch.

     

    Speaking on the launch, Varun Duggirala, Content chief @The Glitch said:

    “Over the last eight-plus years, we have always relied on a core brand insight driven strategy to build brands across platforms and consumers. It is this very thought process that has helped us create effective branded content as a core part of a brand’s value chain, and we have used that learning to come up with an effective yet fluid system that works for brands, for consumers, for creators and for platforms. The beauty of a fluid model is that it will always be in Flux because the world of content changes every day.”

     

    Added Tushar Vyas, Chief Strategy Officer, GroupM: “Flux will be empowering brands by providing powerful meeting point between the consumer and the brand across diverse touchpoints- this brings in a unique layer augmenting GroupM’s capability in consumer insight,  planning and activation. Flux will work closely with GroupM Agencies to deliver effective and engaging content solution for our clients across GroupM in India and beyond.”

     

     

  • John will report to Sudeep Gohil, CSO and Managing Partner, Publicis India

    Russell John joins Publicis as VP- Strategy

    By A Correspondent

     

    Russell John

    Publicis India has announced the appointment of Russell John as Vice President – Strategy. To be based out of Mumbai, John will report to Sudeep Gohil, CSO and Managing Partner, Publicis India.

     

    John joins Publicis India from Lowe Lintas where he was an Associate Vice President. He was one of the planners on the global team for Lifebuoy across the markets of South Asia, South East Asia, North Africa & Middle East. Apart from that, he also managed the regional planning mandate for a host of brands including Pepsodent, Housing.com, Paranjpe Realty, Tata Tea, Britannia, Sonata Watches, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Bajaj Bikes, UTI Mutual Funds, Karvy Finance, BPCL etc.

     

    Commenting on his appointment, Gohil said: “From our initial meetings, I was excited about Russell joining us and working with our clients. He has a rare blend of characteristics, which make him a great person for the growing team. Humility, curiosity, passion, intelligence and a magnetic personality. I’m very enthusiastic to see his ideas come to bear on the work we are doing in the agency.”

     

    Sudeep Gohil

    Expressing his views on joining the agency, John said: “In Sudeep Gohil, Srija Chatterjee and Paritosh Srivastava, I found leaders who I wanted to associate with. It seemed like a buzzing and encouraging environment, which would give me an opportunity to add value to both the group as well as a varied set of brands. I am looking forward to lots of exciting associations and doing some great work for Publicis India.”

     

     

  • Chumbak has evolved into a lifestyle brand with offline presence in 12 Indian cities

    Ogilvy Blr wins mandate for Chumbak

    By A Correspondent

     

    Ogilvy Bangalore has been awarded the mandate for Chumbak after winning a multi-agency pitch.

     

    Said Vivek Prabhakar, CEO and Co-Founder of Chumbak: “With the strong growth we have seen across our retail and online channels and our fast growing portfolios across Fashion and Home, we realised the need to work with a strong creative partner to help harness the Chumbak story. In Ogilvy we found the perfect partner to realise our ambitions both as a brand and a business.”

     

    Added Madhukar Sabnavis, Vice Chairman and Director- Client Relations, Ogilvy and Mather: “Chumbak is an amazing brand that has built a substantial cult following over the last few years. We are happy to partner them in the next stage of their brand building journey. What’s exciting is how to maintain the balance between consumer needs and designer dreams and intuition as Chumbak expands its footprint in the country.”

     

     

  • Meanwhile, CVL Srinivas who transitions fully to Country Manager, WPP India

    Sameer Singh is CEO, GroupM South Asia

     

    GroupM has announced the appointment of Sameer ‘Sam’ Singh as CEO of its South Asia operations. Singh will lead the continued development of GroupM’s data-centric enablement for its agencies as they deliver competitive advantage to clients with digital leadership and content. Based in Gurugram starting in July, Singh will report to CVL Srinivas, Country Manager, WPP India and Mark Patterson, CEO, GroupM Asia Pacific.

     

    Singh joins GroupM from Google India where he was Director- Sales, responsible for the agency business. He was earlier based at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, California where he worked on measurement, brand consulting, insights and product solutions. In a career spanning over 25 years across various geographies including India, China, UK, USA, and the Middle East, Singh, an alumnus of IIM Calcutta, worked across brand management, marketing services, media, forecasting ROI and research, sales and procurement at Gillette, P&G, GSK and Google. Prior to Google, he was VP, Global Media at GSK where he led their global pitch, set up the global media team and embedded digital excellence.

     

    Srinivas has been CEO for GroupM South Asia since January 2013. In October 2017, he was given the additional responsibility of Country Manager for WPP India. He will now transition fully to his WPP role.

     

    On Singh’s appointment, CVL Srinivas, Country Manager, WPP India said: “When planning the leadership succession, we found in Sam the perfect candidate who could take GroupM South Asia to the next level. We have built a strong enabling environment for our agencies with data centricity, digital leadership and content services. Sam has a track record of driving change at organisations focused on media, technology, brands and ROI. I look forward to working with Sam who has been a client, a media partner and a friend for many years”.

     

    Commenting on his appointment, Mark Patterson, CEO GroupM Asia Pacific said: “Sam is a unique talent and a great business partner with a fantastic track record delivering growth for market-leading world-class businesses across the globe. He now joins another one, and we are excited, proud and pleased to welcome him to GroupM South Asia.”

     

    Speaking on his appointment, Singh said: “The India market is transitioning to the next level of media sophistication, with GroupM adroitly navigating this space for their clients, and along with their media partners. I am super excited to join the GroupM team on this wonderful journey, and I look forward to bringing to the table, my experiences built at Google, as a Marketer, and while working across emerging and developed markets. I look forward to contributing, and to learning from my colleagues, our clients, and our partners.”

     

     

  • E-Commerce to grow 15 per cent in 2018, representing 10 per cent of Retail

    GroupM report predicts online media surpassing Linear TV in 2018

    By A Correspondent

     

    GroupM has released a new report, ‘State of Digital’ offering intelligence on consumer media consumption and advertising investment trends worldwide. The  new report focuses on the impact of technology and digital capabilities on consumers and advertisers.

     

    GroupM tabulated consumers’ time spent with each media format, globally, and calculated average time spent with media overall. In 2018, consumers will spend an average 9.73 hours with media, up from 9.68 hours in 2017 (figures weighted by media investment). Additionally, GroupM predicts time spent with online media will overtake time spent with linear TV for the first time, globally, in 2018. Online will have a 38 per cent share, TV 37 per cent, and the balance spread primarily across print and

     

    Increased time spent with online media supports ongoing e-commerce escalation. Thirty-five countries supplied 2017 e-commerce data to GroupM revealing cumulative transactions worth $2.105 trillion, growth of 17 per cent over the prior year. GroupM predicts 15 per cent growth in 2018 to $2.442 trillion or about 10% of all

     

    For the report, GroupM also examined programmatic (automated) ad investment trends. On average across reporting countries, 44 per cent of online display investment was transacted programmatically in 2017 versus 31 per cent in 2016. This will rise to 47 per cent in 2018. For online video investment, programmatic is smaller; 22 per cent in 2017 versus 17 per cent in 2016 and predicted to rise to 24 per cent this

     

    GroupM also surveyed WPP’s network to better see the forest for the trees on industry hot topics.

    Blockchain: So far, there is scant evidence of practical application. “Blockchain’s main attraction is its distributed ledger which tells everyone everything and thus presents the opportunity to reduce inefficiency or cheating. However, its Achilles’ heel is the need to keep every participating computer updated with everything all the time, and that’s too slow for a real time world,” states Adam Smith, GroupM’s Futures Director.

     

    AI: Conversely, respondents reported ample development and scaled deployments with Artificial Intelligence (AI). “Arguably, today’s most advanced marketing tools are the advanced algorithms helping brands analyze which creative or media placement is performing the best, at scale and speed,” states Smith. “Among many future applications, we expect AI to helpfully emerge in fighting fraud that evades conventional rules-based

     

    Data: Regarding marketer application of data to media investment, respondents cited ample room for improvement. Clients are increasingly aware of the value of owned/acquired data, but are often risk-averse to harvesting, storing and distributing it. In many smaller countries, available data is poor. Most U.S. clients are using first-party data to activate digital media, and they’ve frequently invested in enterprise data management platforms (DMPs). Other markets are not so far along for varying reasons. Marketers most often using first-party data are performance-oriented, e-commerce driven, and typically in auto, travel, hospitality, banking, or sometimes supermarkets with well-managed end-point of sale

     

    Digital video competition: Because measurement of premium video audiences across platforms is woefully inadequate in every market, GroupM asked respondents to simply estimate the share of TV incumbents versus digital insurgents. Legacy TV players are believed to hold three-fourths of all video hours but less than a third (29 per cent) online video hours.

     

    Metrics & viewability: GroupM believes that effective advertising must be in view and/or in hearing, and we take a leading position in setting industry and commercial viewability practices. Constituents reported some industry works-in-progress to enhance measurement of omni-platform video audiences. As this progresses, viewability continues to be debated with some contrarians suggesting 100 per cent in-view ads in mobile environments can sometimes be intrusive and can be negative to consumer experience and thus brands.

     

    In-housing: Respondents said this is more often talked about than done, but several countries reported hybrid arrangements – typically, clients taking on strategy but leaving execution to agencies. Most inhousing involved the biggest clients doing the simplest programmatic functions.

     

    Price inflation: Respondents cited two inflation drivers: high demand for premium, brand-safe content and poor measurement of OTT and mobile platforms; the scarcity of measurable inventory drives up prices.

     

    The duopoly: No look at the global digital landscape would be complete without acknowledgement that Google and Facebook continue to be the key growth drivers. Google search is critical to clients, and YouTube is increasingly important for scaled, premium video. Concerns over the quality of programmatic inventory in the Google Display Network persist, but remedies are being pursued. Facebook’s success is partly due to the delivery of younger audiences via Instagram. The surge in large-advertiser investment in 2016-2017 also helped double Facebook’s share of digital investment ex-

     

    “Automation and talent are the big themes in advertising’s current revolution.” said Kelly Clark, CEO, GroupM Global. “One of the downsides of specialization is the increase in specialists who know more and more about less and less. We have to use automation to liberate brain-power, so talented people can look across the entire media ecosystem to help clients optimize short-term results and create long-term brand value.”