By A Correspondent
Over the last ninety years, Publicis Groupe has worked closely with its clients to build some of the most iconic brands around the world.  Today as we enter the era of the fourth industrial revolution wherein the lines between physical, digital and biological spheres are narrowing, it is imperative for large companies to avoid the ‘Kodak moment’. Our goal is to help Publicis Groupe clients brace for this change by helping them innovate and stay ahead of disruption. We intend to do this by bringing together some of the sharpest minds from within the tech startup ecosystem in India and the Publicis Groupe brand builders to ‘hack’ solutions on the various brands that we work with across the Groupe.
Uff, did all of the above mean anything to you. But then that’s communication conglomerates are masters at doing. Foreplay.
So read further:
The Publicis Groupe has always strived to help their clients constantly stay ahead of the game. In the late 50s Publicis Groupe founder Marcel Bleustein-Blanchet started the Drugstore near Arc de Triomphe in Paris to bring multiple brands physically under one roof, with the express idea of getting ‘consumers to experience brands and for brands to get to experiment with them in return’. Today, we invoke our founder’s vision to bring this concept of disruptive innovation thinking & prototyping to our clients and help them ‘thrive at scale’.
Okay, okay, let’s get on with it.
Drugstore India is an innovation facility (oh, thank heavens, it’s not been called a lab!) that fosters relationships between large companies and early stage startups for mutual benefit.  This innovation thinking will be mentored by the best of minds across Publicis Groupe companies such as L&K | Saatchi & Saatchi, Publicis India, Leo-Burnett, MSLGROUP and Razorfish. True to the spirit of today’s startup ecosystem, where collaboration matters more than competition, the idea for a platform such as Drugstore is just right and timely.
The idea of the Drugstore is fundamentally based on the spirit of identifying and harnessing these innovations and innovators and bridging the gap between needs and resources. Drugstore India will collaborate with leading players in the Indian startup ecosystem like Zone Startups amongst others to bring some of the proven and agile innovation programmes such as Minibar, Meet the Makers, Demo Days, Supper Club, Rapid Prototyping and Incubator Accelerator to capitalise on inventions and have radical outcomes in the process, products and services.
Besides helping successful client brands stay successful, Drugstore will add strategic marketing value to the emerging startup fraternity through both physical and cloud-based access to brand building resources across the Publicis Groupe and by collaborating with them to help them acquire scale expertise and by mentoring and immersing them on turning any business into a successful brand.
Publicis Groupe has successfully launched the Drugstore in London, Sydney, Johannesburg and Zurich and the first Drugstore edition in Asia is now officially starting in India and will be based in Mumbai.
The Drugstore India team will be led by Anil K. Nair (CEO, Digital L&K | Saatchi & Saatchi) along with a core team comprising Sreeraman Thiagarajan (Publicis), Parth Nagar & Aarti Samant (L&K Saatchi & Saatchi), Sanju Menon (Leo-Burnett), Suryasen Kundu (MSL Group), & Swapnil Puranik (Razorfish) and  under the overall  mentorship of Praveen Kenneth, Chairman & Managing Director, L&K Saatchi & Saatchi.
Phew!
So that was the communiqué we received from the Publicis Group this morning (Tue, June 14). Now, basically this is what it’s all about: Publicis Groupe has set up (no, we didn’t saying waking up to!) the increasing demands of the start-up community and setting up a pan-group(e) initiative. We are sure this doesn’t mean Anil K Nair and Co will give up their rest of their commitments and embrace this alone.
Now, here’s a thought that was expressed by an insider?  Does the fact that Praveen Kenneth has been entrusted with the responsibility mean that if this is a success he could be given greater responsibilities within the group? Like overseeing the umbrella company of the communications business of Publicis? India is one of the few countries that doesn’t have a head for Pubicis Communications though Publicis Media did name Anupriya Acharya as CEO for the group’s media businesses. Or is it that it’s a sop to Kenneth and someone else may be made the big(g) boss?
We’ll know it soon. A CEO of one of the Publicis Comm firms told us that India may not have that such a position.
PostScript: Why name it Drugstore? We know it’s advertising and it helps in being disruptive etc etc, but Drugstore? Next is what? Well, as long as what’s dished out are good solutions and not placebos. Right?
