MAM
Ankit Agarwal takes the wheel as director of entertainment ad sales at JioStar
MUMBAI: Ankit Agarwal has stepped into the role of director of entertainment ad sales at JioStar, adding serious firepower to the streaming and broadcast network’s commercial engine. A media sales pro with 18 years in the trenches, Agarwal has built his reputation on sealing high-value partnerships, boosting market share and leading sharp execution across television and digital platforms.
Before the move to JioStar, Agarwal spent 13 years at Viacom18 in a string of senior ad sales roles, driving growth across marquee brands and campaigns. His career began in radio, news and broadcast networks including TV Today Network and Mahuaa Media, followed by rapid climbs through sales leadership.
Known for his strong relationships with top advertisers and agency heavyweights, Agarwal blends revenue discipline with high-energy dealmaking across genres, formats and regions.
Now strapped in at JioStar, Agarwal is chasing bigger numbers, bolder ideas and the next big win. The race is on and he is gunning for the lead.
Brands
IICT partners with Gativedhi to bring studio production tools to students
New MoU lets students explore AI-driven production pipelines for AVGC-XR
MUMBAI: The Indian Institute of Creative Technologies (IICT) has teamed up with Gativedhi Technologies to give students a front-row seat to modern studio production. The collaboration will integrate Gativedhi’s AI-powered production intelligence platform, Shotrack, into academic programmes, letting students experience the workflow systems used by animation, VFX and gaming studios.
Under the MoU, faculty, students and researchers will get hands-on access to Shotrack through beta programmes, pilot deployments and academic evaluations. This will allow them to explore simulated production pipelines, understand asset management, track tasks and monitor schedules, essentially seeing how complex projects come together behind the scenes.
Shotrack is designed to tackle a key industry challenge: when multiple studios work on the same project, differing internal systems often create bottlenecks, slow approvals and complicate version control. The platform provides a unified production environment, enabling smoother collaboration across distributed teams while generating operational insights and predictive analytics to optimise crew allocation, forecast schedule risks and manage costs.
The collaboration also opens doors to Gativedhi’s wider ecosystem. Upcoming tools include StudioTrack, for studio operations management covering budgeting, recruitment and IT infrastructure, and WorkTrack, which measures workflow efficiency and team productivity across industries.
IICT plans to embed these tools into programmes covering animation pipelines, VFX workflows, gaming production and media project management. Students will also benefit from guest lectures, masterclasses, workshops, internships and research projects that connect academic learning with real-world studio practices.
IICT CEO Vishwas Deoskar, said the partnership provides “An environment where production pipeline tools can be explored, tested and refined while students gain insight into how large-scale productions are organised.”
Gativedhi Technologies founder & CEO Senthil Kumar added, “This collaboration introduces students to real-world studio management tools and helps us improve our platform with academic feedback.”
With Shotrack in classrooms, India’s future animators, VFX artists and gaming producers will get a taste of studio life long before they step into one.
