Ad Campaigns
Abby Awards 2025: Round 1 shortlist unveiled, Leo Burnett and Enormous Brands lead the creative charge
MUMBAI: The AdClub has revealed the Round 1 shortlist for the Abby Awards 2025, powered by One Show, with industry heavyweights Leo Burnett, Enormous Brands, FCB, VML, McCann, Famous Innovations, and Havas leading the charge in the creative categories.
A star-studded lineup of creative powerhouses and brands has made the cut, including Good Morning Films, Tribes Communications, Atom Network, Cheil, Schbang, Mudra Max, Y&H, Grey Group, Hogarth Studios, Vanilla Films, Mindshare, BBH, and Tilt Brand Solutions.
The client roster shines just as bright, with AIS, Jaguar, P&G Whisper, Manifest, The Times of India, Axis Bank, Coca-Cola, Finolex, Reliance General Insurance, Durex, Flipkart, Lays, and Dream11 all vying for glory.
Digital dynamos like Schbang, BC Web Wise, Digitas, and Interactive Avenues have carved out their space, while design virtuosos Open Design, Hyphen Brands, and Tree Design have made their mark.
Video craft maestros—Good Morning Films, Vanilla Films, Bang Bang, Kitchen Video, and Superfly Films—add a cinematic edge to the shortlist.
The broadcast and publishing giants aren’t left behind, with Bennett Coleman, ABP, Jagran Prakashan, Viacom, Star India, The Hindu Group, and Zee Entertainment staking their claim for the trophy.
Start-up agencies like Y&H, tgthr, Brave, and Believe Trinity have also entered the spotlight, proving that fresh talent can compete with the best.
Awards governing council chairman Ajay Kakar expressed his delight: “The shortlist for the Abby Awards 2025—across both creative and media categories—is now out. It’s heartening to see the breadth and diversity of agencies, clients, brands, publishers, and broadcasters who have made it through the first round of rigorous jury evaluation. This wide representation is a reflection of the vibrancy and depth of talent in our industry. With the second and third rounds of judging ahead, we now look forward to seeing the best rise to the top. All roads lead to the awards nights between 21 and 23 May.”
The round 2 and round 3 judging are already underway, with the final winners set to be crowned at the much-anticipated Goafest 2025.
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
