AD Agencies
RIP David Abbott, you will be missed!
MUMBAI : If you are someone who keeps a keen eye on British advertising then you will surely know who David Abbott was. Abbott, a British advertising executive and founder of Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, passed away on Saturday, aged 75.
Abbott started his career in advertising as a copywriter at Mather & Crowther and later got associated with DDB, London. It was in 1971, when he founded French Gold Abbott. After seven years he headed to establish Abbott Mead Vickers (AMV).
Abbott got his due recognition when he was in AMV. The veterans in the industry know Abbott as a person with wit and sharp vision. He is known for creating some classic campaigns for brands such as Volvo, Sainsbury’s, Ikea, Chivas Regal, The Economist, Yellow Pages, and the RSPC. In 1991 BBDO acquired a stake in AMV and appended its name.
He is also known to have authored a book titled, “The Upright Piano Player” in 2010.
Take a look at some of the popular work done by Abbott:
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According to international news portals, it is understood that D&AD plans to pay tribute to Abbott at its awards ceremony this week.
(Images sourced from Twitter)
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.
