AD Agencies
Brands take centre stage at Mipcom Cannes 2025
PARIS: Brand money is flooding into television. At Mipcom Cannes this month, the world’s largest TV market is rolling out the red carpet for corporate storytellers with the first international edition of BrandStorytelling, a summit that has spent a decade building its reputation at Sundance.
The two half-day event on 13 and 14 October brings together an unlikely crowd: global brands like Ancestry and Indeed, creative agencies including Dentsu and McCann, and heavyweight studios such as Banijay, Fremantle and BBC StoryWorks. Their mission is to turn corporate cash into compelling content—and to do deals that make it happen.
Rick Parkhill, the producer and media entrepreneur who founded BrandStorytelling, reckons the sector has come of age. “Brands are increasingly behind some of the biggest stories on our screens globally,” he says. The event’s expansion from Park City to the French Riviera suggests he’s onto something.
Among the speakers are Doug Scott, founder of Unxnown and an alumnus of Endeavour and Ogilvy, and Kim Miller Olko, global chief marketing officer at Toys”R”Us and president of its in-house studio. Representatives from over 20 organisations will take the stage, from the Branded Content Marketing Association to entertainment giants like UTA.
Mipcom Cannes director Lucy Smith says the “overwhelming response” from the industry confirmed the appetite for a dedicated brand-content forum. The summit promises to unlock new funding streams and co-production opportunities at a time when traditional television budgets are under pressure and brands are hunting for more sophisticated ways to reach audiences.
The event, sponsored by Fell + Co., Storybones Media and IPG Mediabrands Entertainment is part of Mipcom’s broader embrace of the creator economy. Last year’s market drew over 10,500 delegates from more than 100 countries—a captive audience for anyone peddling the promise of brand-funded programming.
AD Agencies
The smell that told Mumbaikars which station was next
Tata AIA turns Mumbai’s Parle-G memory into a sharp, city-wise outdoor play
MUMBAI: When a biscuit factory became Mumbai’s unofficial station announcement. Long before smartphone maps and automated announcements, commuters on Mumbai’s Western line relied on their noses. As trains rolled into Vile Parle, compartments filled with the warm, sweet smell of baking biscuits from the Parle-G factory. It was a cue to gather bags, wake dozing children and shuffle towards the door.
Now that memory has been pressed into service by Tata AIA Life Insurance as part of its 25-year anniversary outdoor campaign — a city-by-city salute to the lived moments that shape urban life.
One hoarding, mounted close to the old factory site, reads: “We have been protecting Mumbaikars since Vile Parle smelled of freshly made biscuits.” Spare. Local. Loaded.
The broader campaign, rolled out across major metros, leans hard into contextual storytelling. In Kolkata, it nods to trams. In Pune, to Magarpatta’s transformation. In Bengaluru, to a time before IT parks. In Chennai, to OMR before it led to tech corridors. Each line anchors the brand’s longevity to a shared civic memory.
The Mumbai execution is the most evocative. For decades, the Parle-G factory was more than a production unit. It was a sensory landmark. Residents nearby set their clocks by the factory horn. Office-goers marked their commute by the waft of glucose and flour. When the plant shut, the city lost more than jobs. It lost a rhythm.
By placing the hoarding beside the former factory, the insurer collapses distance between copy and context. The site does half the storytelling. The rest comes from commuters who remember opening steel tiffins packed with Parle-G, or jolting awake as the train slowed.
It is a neat piece of brand positioning. Rather than trumpet balance sheets or policy counts, Tata AIA borrows emotional equity from the city itself. Twenty-five years becomes less a milestone and more a presence — steady, local, embedded.
Outdoor advertising is often a blunt instrument. This one is anything but. It whispers. It remembers. And in doing so, it sells trust without sounding like it is selling at all.
The scent may have faded. The memory has not.
