MAM
Taproot launches new division TRIP
MUMBAI: Taproot is launching a new division, Taproot India Plus (TRIP).
TRIP, headed by Purushottam Joshi, will handle creative execution and services, specialising in non – mass media and production activities for the advertising, publicity and marketing industry.
The new division will be based out of Mumbai but the agency’s multi city network tie ups will support national level requirements too.
Joshi, a partner in TRIP, will be leading it as a director and will be the face of this unit with an experienced team under him.
Joshi said, “There is a disconnect between what kind of state-of-the-art technology available in the market versus what’s being used or rather how it‘s being used to reach consumers. In fact he is positive that ventures like TRIP can bridge the divide between brands and consumer across non mass-media touch points in a more relevant and effective way”
The division will not only talk about the standard BTL but every single experience point where a brand has a connect with its consumer, for example POS, brand signage, in-shop displays, merchandise, exhibitions and events.
Taproot India co-founder Santosh Padhi said, “The industry spends on retail / on-ground/ merchandise are already steep but sadly, the quality needs to improve much more to honestly justify those spends. The industry has moved ahead quite a bit on film production in last five years with our television work looking far better than what it was a decade back. But we are yet to do the same in other areas”.
Taproot India chief creative officer Agnello Dias added, “This sort of service does exist in international markets where once the big idea is arrived at, the creative services execution team, with their practical knowledge of on-ground and retail space takes the idea forward in a more engaging, entertaining and effective way. To the extent that at times most clients do brief these set of team independently like one does to a research or a digital agency”.
Joshi has over 25 years of experience in the advertising and print industry. He has worked in agency networks such as JWT, Euro RSCG and Mudra.
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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.
