MAM
AMES 2015: Lowe Lintas + Partners bags 10 awards, Maxus India wins 5
MUMBAI: The Asian Marketing Effectiveness & Strategy (AMES) Awards 2015 declared Lowe Lintas + Partners as the Agency of the Year in the Effectiveness category.
After bagging the maximum number of shortlists from India (17), the agency managed to win a total of 10 awards comprising four Silver and six Bronze trophies.
In all, the Indian agencies put out a sterling performance by winning 31 trophies this year. The Indian contingent was led by Lowe Lintas + Partners, who with a rich haul of 10 trophies emerged as the agency with the largest number of wins from not just India but also in the Asia Pacific region.
The awards tally of Lowe Lintas + Partners includes:
Commenting on the performance put up by the agency, Lowe Lintas + Partners CEO Joseph George said, “After being declared earlier this year by WARC as 2014’s Most Effective Agency in the World, this performance at the AMES last night is a further confirmation of what we and juries around the world believe what we are good at – delivering disruptive creative solutions that work in the mind and in the market. We look forward to carry this momentum and performance right through the year!”
Lowe Lintas + Partners national planning director S Subramanyeswar added, “We thank the jury for acknowledging our work and giving it due recognition from a host of entries across the Asia Pacific. This appreciation for effective work gives us the opportunity to do more. We would like to build on this momentum and hope to beat ourselves next year again.”
On the other hand, global communications consultancy firm Maxus won five awards at the Asian Marketing Effectiveness and Strategy Awards. The ceremony, which took place on 3 June, saw over 600 entries. India had a total of about 15 shortlists across different agencies out of which six were from Maxus India. Maxus India won two silvers and one bronze award for Tata Tea Power of 49 Campaign and two bronze awards in the data analytics and retail analytics categories too.
Maxus south Asia managing director Kartik Sharma said, “Maxus has always made strong, enthusiastic and consisted efforts to achieve the best and future ready in a digitally competitive market where every agency is striving for better than the best. We at Maxus believe these wins have given us an overall and stronger edge in the market, helping us bring unlimited satisfaction to our existing clients and bring new clients into the fold. We are of course ecstatic about the wins! We would like to share the credits with Tata Tea who have believed in the idea and the entire team who has put in the hard work over the years. These wins also prove beyond doubt that Maxus has an undying spirit of wanting to deliver the best for our clients always and keeping them involved at the levels without any hesitation.”
This year, out of a total of 1100 entries and 289 shortlists, the juries awarded trophies to 144 winners from 10 countries – three Platinum, 26 Gold, 45 Silver, 75 Bronze trophies. Country-wise, it was India that took the lead with 31 wins followed by China at 26 and Australia with 24 wins.
Digital
Content India 2026 opens with a copro pitch, a spice evangelist and a £10,000 prize for Indian storytelling
Dish TV and C21Media’s three-day summit puts seven ambitious projects before an international jury, and two walk away with serious development money
MUMBAI: India’s content industry gathered in Mumbai this March for Content India 2026, a three-day summit organised by Dish TV in partnership with C21Media, and it wasted no time making a statement. The event opened with a Copro Pitch that put seven scripted and unscripted television concepts before an international panel of judges, and by the end of it, two projects had walked away with £10,000 each in marketing prize money from C21Media to support development and international promotion.
The jury, comprising Frank Spotnitz, Fiona Campbell, Rashmi Bajpai, Bal Samra and Rachel Glaister, evaluated a shortlist that ranged from a dark Mumbai comedy-drama about mental health (Dirty Minds, created by Sundar Aaron) to a Delhi coming-of-age mystery (Djinn Patrol, by Neha Sharma and Kilian Irwin), a techno-thriller about a teenage gaming prodigy (Kanpur X Satori, by Suchita Bhatia), an investigative crime drama blending mythology and modern thriller (The Age of Kali, by Shivani Bhatija), a documentary on India’s spice heritage (The Masala Quest, hosted by Sarina Kamini), a documentary on competitive gaming (Respawn: India’s Esports Revolution, by George Mangala Thomas and Sangram Mawari), and a reality-horror competition merging gaming and immersive fear (Scary Goose, by Samar Iqbal).
The session was hosted by Mayank Shekhar.
The two winners were Djinn Patrol, backed by Miura Kite, formerly of Participant Media and known for Chinatown and Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey, with Jaya Entertainment, producers of Real Kashmir Football Club, also attached; and The Masala Quest, created and hosted by Sarina Kamini, an Indian-Australian cook, author and self-described “spice evangelist.”
The summit also unveiled the Content India Trends Report, whose findings made for bracing reading. Daoud Jackson, senior analyst at OMDIA, set the tone: “By 2030, online video in India will nearly double the revenue of traditional TV, becoming the main driver of growth.” He noted that in 2025, India produced a quarter of all YouTube videos globally, overtaking the United States, while Indians collectively spend 117 years daily on YouTube and 72 years on Instagram. Traditional subscription TV is declining as free TV and connected TV gain ground, forcing broadcasters to innovate. “AI-generated content is just 2 per cent of engagement,” Jackson added, “highlighting the dominance of high-quality human content. The key for Indian media companies is scaling while monetising effectively from day one.”
Hannah Walsh, principal analyst at Ampere Analysis, added hard numbers to the picture. India produced over 24,000 titles in January 2026 alone, with 19,000 available internationally. The country now accounts for 12 per cent of Asia-Pacific content spend, up from 8 per cent in 2021, outpacing both Japan and China. Key exporters include JioStar, Zee Entertainment, Sony India, Amazon and Netflix, delivering over 7,500 Indian-produced titles abroad each year. The top importing markets are Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, the United States and the Philippines. Scripted content dominates globally at 88 per cent, with crime dramas and children’s and family titles performing particularly strongly.
Manoj Dobhal, chief executive and executive director of Dish TV India, framed the summit’s ambition squarely. “Stories don’t need translation. They need a platform, discovery, and reach, local or global,” he said. “India produces more movies than any country, our streaming platforms compete globally, and our tech and creators win international awards. Yet fragmentation slows growth. Producers, platforms, and tech move in different lanes. We need shared spaces, collaboration, and an ecosystem where ideas, technology, and people meet. That is why we built Content India.”
The data, the pitches and the prize money all pointed to the same conclusion: India is not waiting for the world to discover its stories. It is building the infrastructure to sell them.
