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Tag: Gautam Thakar

  • Star Sports has unveiled the campaign – ‘Ek Saath Waali Baat’, in the run-up to the much-awaited season of Dream11 IPL

    Star Sports launches ‘Ek Saath Waali Baat’ for IPL 2020

    By A Correspondent

     

    Star Sports has unveiled the campaign – ‘Ek Saath Waali Baat’, in the run-up to the much-awaited season of Dream11 IPL.

     

    Said Gautam Thakar, CEO – Star Sports: “As a country, we have always come together during testing times and we have seen the same over the last few months. There has been a greater sense of community and empathy that has demonstrated the resilience of the human spirit. The ‘Ek Saath Waali Baat’ campaign has been created with this same ethos. Dream11 IPL is the most-watched sporting event in the country and this year, it is even more special. The campaign builds on the sense of community and signals towards the much-needed emotion of hope,”.

     

     

  • The top honours went to Bisleri, conceptualised by 82.5 Communications, which won the award for excellence in creativity (Best Creative on TV)  while Netflix, conceptualised by The Script Room, was recognized for the Best Use of Integrated Media (Best Creative on Digital)

    Bisleri and Netflix win at Star Re.Imagine Awards 2019

    By A Correspondent

     

    The second edition of the Star Re-Imagine Awards saw Bisleri and Netflix bagging top honours. Showcasing excellence in creativity (Best Creative on TV and Best Creative on Digital), these campaigns were broadcast on TV and Digital during the recently concluded, IPL 2019 on Star Sports Network. Gautam Thakar, CEO, Star Sports and Guest of Honour, Rahul Dravid; one of India’s finest batsmen and cricketing legend, and the recent under 19 ICC World Cup winning coach, felicitated the winners.

     

    The awards were attended by stalwarts from the Indian Marketing, Advertising, and Media fraternity who graciously applauded the efforts of all nominees. The winners and other exemplary campaigns were selected by jury members comprising Dave Trott, R. Balki, Rama Bijapurkar, Swati Bhattacharya and Piyush Pandey. With 10 brands making the final shortlist, Bisleri and Netflix were declared winners. The judges selected campaigns that excelled in both – creativity, innovation and those that showed a distinct and unique creative approach on the IPL platform.

     

    The top honours went to Bisleri, conceptualised by 82.5 Communications, which won the award for excellence in creativity (Best Creative on TV)  while Netflix, conceptualised by The Script Room, was recognized for the Best Use of Integrated Media (Best Creative on Digital)

     

    Said Gautam Thakar, CEO, Star Sports:  “I am very glad that the second season of VIVO IPL was Bigger and Better on the Star Sports network and Hotstar. This year, the strong regional strategy of having four independent dedicated language channels in Tamil, Telugu, Bangla and Kannada, the Select Dugout and Super Funday feed contributed immensely to the increased reach of VIVO IPL. The success of this year has been even more gratifying, that despite the Indian general elections and TRAI regulations, VIVO IPL continues to grow. It has been an exciting season and on behalf of the Star Sports Network and Hotstar, I would like to thank the creative media agencies and clients who have made VIVO IPL, the Superbowl of India. My heartiest congratulations to Bisleri and Netflix, and to the 300 brands that made this VIVO IPL 2019 the biggest ever.”

     

    Over 300 brands were on board for the VIVO IPL 2019 across TV and Digital platforms from various sectors like Telecom, Consumer Durables (Handset), Retail and Lifestyle, Food Delivery and Restaurant (Hospitality), E-commerce, Online services, Automotive, Gaming, Online Payment Wallets, Paints and Adhesives FMCG.

     

    Brands that received Special Mention from the jury (In alphabetical order, includes the two winners):

    Amazon Echo – ‘#JustAsk’

    Bisleri – ‘Har paani ki bottle Bisleri nahi’

    Budweiser – ‘Becks Ice – packaged drinking water’

    Coca Cola – ‘Say it with coke’

    Dream11 – ‘Yeh game hai mahaan’

    Freecharge – ‘Sirf app nahi, appreciation’

    Intel – ‘Change your pc, change your business’

    Netflix – ‘Selection Day’

    Snickers – ‘Hungry? Grab a snickers’

    Swiggy – ‘What a Delivery’

     

     

  • Conceptualized and created by Ogilvy & Mather, the campaign highlights all participating teams that are coming to England to win the crown

    Star Sports unveils ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 campaign

    By A Correspondent

     

    Star Sports, the official global broadcaster of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019, has launched a campaign to celebrate the tournament starting May 30 across the Star Sports network and Hotstar.

     

    Conceptualised and created by Ogilvy & Mather, the campaign highlights all participating teams that are coming to England to win the crown – the World cup trophy.

     

    Speaking on the campaign, Gautam Thakar, CEO Star Sports said: “The ICC Cricket World Cup is regarded as the most prestigious prize in World Cricket both, by players and viewers. Bringing the competitive element that every country holds during this tournament; the campaign showcases the very nucleus of the sport and how every team is going to England to get their hands on the Crown of Cricket. With more fan films in the pipeline, Star India is excited to bring the #CricketKaCrown theme alive and provide a spectacular TV viewing experience for the fans across the country.”

     

    Speaking on the campaign, Sukesh Nayak, CCO Ogilvy added: “This is the World Cup. It’s the crown of cricket. And the best in the world are coming to England to get it. Our big idea came from the thought of coming to England to get the crown. We took a fan perspective to this entire thing. The campaign will have multiple films and fully integrated execution. Radio, activation and digital will build the big idea of #CricketKaCrown.”

     

     

  • Panel includes Dave Trott, Piyush Pandey, R Balki, Rama Bijapurkar and Swati Bhattacharya

    2019 edition of Star Re.Imagine Awards announced

    By A Correspondent

     

    Star India has announced the second edition of the Star Re.Imagine Awards for the best advertising on its television network and Hotstar during IPL2019.

     

    The jury list is impressive: Dave Trott, who has won the D&AD President’s Award, London for Lifetime Achievement in Advertising; R Balki, film-maker, Rama Bijapurkar,  market strategy expert; Swati Bhattacharya – CCO, FCB India and Piyush Pandey, Ogilvy Worldwide creative boss.

     

    Speaking on the announcement, Gautam Thakar, CEO, Star Sports said: “Sports is a great unifier and VIVO IPL’s massive reach and engagement provide the perfect platform for every brand to reach their audience. We are excited to announce the 2nd edition of the Star Re.Imagine Awards to celebrate the creativity of the top marketers in the country.  We have an additional award category this year and have witnessed some amazing storytelling from brands so far. I am excited to welcome our world class jury and look forward to the results.”

     

     

  • The film has been conceptualised by Taproot Dentsu

    Taproot film creates film for Star Sports to promote Ind-Aus series

    By A Correspondent

     

    Setting the tone for the upcoming Australia-India cricket tour, Star Sports has rolled out a humorous campaign around the same. The film has been conceptualised by Taproot Dentsu.

     

    Said Gautam Thakar, CEO, Star Sports: “The campaign amplifies the fun banter that all fans look forward to in every India vs Australia series. This series kicks off a “summer of cricket” on Star Sports including the VIVO IPL and the ICC World Cup. We are even more excited this year as we will now telecast this on our dedicated sports channels in Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada for our regional viewers apart from our existing English and Hindi feeds.”

     

    Speaking about the campaign, Taproot Dentsu CCO Santosh Padhi added: “Cricket banter gets a lot of attention in popular media and Paine’s remark has provided grist to our creative mill. The Aussies are good sports and we’ve used their dig against them, to set up a face-off between the two teams. A cheeky personality like Sehwag was an easy choice as the celebrity face for this campaign.”

     

     

  • The hunt for someone to helm the network’s sports business has been on for over six months, ever since former CEO Nitin Kukreja left the company in March 2017

    Gautam Thakar to join Star Sports as CEO

    By A Correspondent

     

    Star India has announced the appointment of Gautam Thakar as CEO for Star Sports. He will join to helm the sports broadcast business for Star in January. The hunt for someone to helm the network’s sports business has been on for over six months, ever since former CEO Nitin Kukreja left the company in March 2017.

     

    Said Star India MD Sanjay Gupta:“We are happy to welcome Gautam into the Star India family to lead our next paradigm in sports broadcasting. He brings to the table a wealth of knowledge and proven strategic capabilities. We at Star have always set ourselves a bold growth agenda and we are confident that Gautam will contribute in taking the multi-sports culture that Star has pioneered in India, to the next level.”

     

    Thakar brings over 20 years of deep operating and leadership experience. He started his career as a brand manager with P&G in India, then led baazee.com as a founding management team member.

     

    He spent a decaseat eBay in a variety of leadership roles (Country Manager for eBay India, global marketing leader for eBay’s International markets as well as leader of eBay’s multi-billion dollar cross border business, CEO of shopping.com (an eBay acquisition) and general manager responsible for building a multi hundred million dollar adtech business) before leading LivingSocial (acquired by Groupon).