MAM
R. Balakrishnan bids adieu to MullenLowe Lintas
MUMBAI: After a three decade long career in the advertising industry, R. Balakrishnan, has decided to move out of MullenLowe Lintas Group, India. The majority of Balki’s advertising years have been spent at the agency where he held the role of group chairman.
Balki joined the agency in 1994 and was based in its Bangalore office then.
MullenLowe Group global CEO Alex Leikikh said, “Balki has been the architect of the stellar agency we have in India today. He leaves behind an operation that’s successful and future-ready, a leadership team that’s perhaps the strongest of any agency in India, and a culture that he shaped along the way while himself leading by example. While we will miss his infectiously passionate presence, we wish him even greater success as a film-maker.”
Speaking of his decision, Balki voiced, “We’ve been planning this for some time now. It’s been a long process of succession planning that concludes with my move. The agency is at its strongest today and I leave feeling satisfied, proud and excited. We have a fine leader in Joe and two world-class creative champions in Amer and Arun. The agency has given me more than 22 years’-worth in opportunities, growth, values and most of all, some friends-for-life.”
Balki started his career in Mudra, before moving on to Lintas, a place that he went on to make his home for over two decades. While with the agency, he’s been the brain behind several globally acclaimed campaigns and brand ideas. Under his leadership, MullenLowe Lintas Group has consistently retained its spot as one of India’s top agencies and a training ground for some of the best advertising minds of the industry.
MullenLowe Lintas Group CEO Joseph George who has worked closely with Balki through all of the 22 years added, “It is impossible and even foolish to try and replace someone like Balki; so we planned the transition differently. As early as July 2015, we put in place, a management structure that would help us move forward as an organisation, while also maximizing the potential and aspirations of great individuals we have. Balki and I have tried to think this through every step of the way, and it’s reached a place where we feel the agency is ready for today, and tomorrow.”
Balki concluded, “There is no bigger happiness than to see a thought actually work the way you had fantasised. Lowe was a thought am proud of. Ok…next!”
AD Agencies
Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
