AD Agencies
BBH India onboards Himanshu Saxena as COO & MD
Mumbai: BBH India, a Publicis Groupe agency, has announced the appointment of Himanshu Saxena as chief operating officer & managing director. Saxena will report to CEO, Leo Burnett-South Asia & chairman, BBH India Dheeraj Sinha.
As BBH’s chief operating officer & managing director, Saxena will be responsible for developing talent, organisational tools, new services and steering these to acquire future-facing businesses.
He brings over 29 years of experience across the communication spectrum, including advertising, marketing & sales, brand management, digital & social, PR, design, and market research.
Saxena has helmed country and multi-office leadership for some of South Asia’s leading organisations, including Lowe, McCann, Trikaya Grey, JWT, Edelman, IMRB & Reliance Jio. Saxena’s passion for leading businesses to market excellence through powerful full-funnel solutions has led these agencies to win accolades at prestigious forums like APAC and India Effies, Cannes, Spikes, Adfest, Goafest, PRAXIS, and SABRE APAC. He has spearheaded creative solutions across iconic brands like Unilever, GSK, PepsiCo, Diageo, Asian Paints, Dubai Tourism, One Plus, Idea Cellular, Audible, and Starbucks, to name a few.
Welcoming Saxena, Sinha said, “BBH India, with its legacy of modern, creative, and effective solutions that are well-entrenched in the modern Indian zeitgeist, has built a reputation as a creative firepower in the country. I am delighted to welcome Saxena onboard. A talented leader known for his deep client relationships, his commitment to business innovation, and his operational acumen, Saxena embodies the black sheep and zag philosophy that will further fuel this brilliant creative engine.”
Speaking on his appointment, Saxena added, “I am both excited and honoured to join BBH. With its legacy of creating stunning work that has transformed not only brands but also categories, BBH India is truly built for the modern age of marketing. I am looking forward to scaling this further and bringing my experience and a fresh perspective to lead such talented individuals and ambitious clients.
BBH India has grown into a creative powerhouse with offices in Mumbai and Delhi and a repertoire of highly effective, consistent, and modern marketing solutions spanning across advertising, design, digital, consulting, and experiential. The agency currently works with a diverse portfolio of brands like Marico, Red Bull, Nestle, Audi, Taco Bell, Mahindra Group, and L’Oreal, among many others. In 2022, BBH won mandates for Hitachi and Roposo and created campaigns like Disney+ Hotstar’s “Thoda Rukh Shah Rukh”; Mahindra Racing’s “Dance For Good” and Marico’s “Re-teach The Teachers.”
AD Agencies
Publicis Brazil’s creative chief Mauro Ramalho lands the jury chair at Abby Awards 2026
Mauro Ramalho brings 25 years of global advertising firepower to the new creative commerce, use of data and B2B category at Goafest
GOA: The Abby Awards 2026, powered by The One Club and The One Show, has appointed Mauro Ramalho, chief creative officer of Publicis Brazil, as jury chair for its newly launched creative commerce, use of data and B2B category. The announcement, made on 18 March, signals the awards’ intent to bring serious international muscle to a category that sits squarely at the intersection of creativity and commercial performance.
Ramalho is not a name that needs much introduction in global advertising circles. Over 25 years spanning three countries, he has worked at some of the industry’s most creatively restless addresses. At AKQA in San Francisco, he worked across McDonald’s, Nike, Fox, Target, Kraft Foods and GAP, and helped lead “The Lost Ring” for McDonald’s, one of the first alternate reality campaigns and among the most awarded projects of its era. He later moved to Organic in Toronto, bridging the Detroit and Toronto offices on Dodge, Jeep and Chrysler, before spending over a decade building CUBOCC into one of Brazil’s most iconic and innovative independent agencies, which subsequently joined the IPG network.
A stint at FCB followed, where Ramalho led integrated work bridging online and offline, before he joined R/GA São Paulo as vice-president and executive creative director, stitching together the São Paulo office with New York, London, Portland and California on global clients including Verizon, Google, Meta, Samsung, American Express and Heineken. He now heads Publicis Brazil as its chief creative officer.
His trophy cabinet includes Clios, Effies, TikTok awards and MMA Smarties, and he has served on juries at the Andys, TikTok and the Lisbon Awards.
The Abby Awards 2026 is scheduled to take place at Goafest 2026 on 20, 21 and 22 May in Goa.
For Indian advertising, landing a jury chair of Ramalho’s calibre for a category built around data-driven creativity and commerce is a statement of ambition. Goafest just raised its own bar.
