MAM
Contagious Pioneers 2024: The best and bravest agencies on the planet
Mumbai: Contagious is pleased to announce the 2024 Contagious Pioneers list, recognising the agencies that are setting the standard for innovation and creative excellence in marketing.
The 2024 winners (in alphabetical order) are:
• BETC Paris
• Colenso BBDO, Auckland
• GUT Buenos Aires
• Howatson+Company, Sydney
• Lucky Generals, London
• Ogilvy India, Mumbai
• Rethink, Toronto
• Uncommon Creative Studio, London
We select our Pioneer agencies by rigorously analysing the work featured on our online intelligence tool, Contagious IQ.
Only campaigns that demonstrate the highest levels of creativity and strategic thinking pass our rigorous editorial filter. The Pioneer agencies are those that had the most campaigns featured on Contagious IQ over the past year, cross-referenced against metrics such as the number of different clients represented across their body of work, and whether the campaigns were selected as ‘Editor’s Picks’ or chosen for more in-depth coverage.
Contagious editor Chloe Markowicz said: ‘At Contagious, we only concern ourselves with the very best marketing in the world. So having a single campaign featured on the Contagious IQ platform is already high praise for any agency, but to be ranked a Contagious Pioneer signifies that an agency has consistently achieved excellence.
‘Our 2024 Pioneers agencies have created work that stands out as the most creative, innovative and effective in the industry. They deserve recognition for campaigns that demonstrate breakthrough thinking and set a new creative standard, exhibiting what future-facing marketing should look like.’
MAM
Sameer Nair shares heartfelt note as he exits Applause Entertainment
After nine years building the streamer’s content engine, one of India’s best-known TV men is moving on
MUMBAI: Sameer Nair is out. The chief executive of Applause Entertainment, the content studio backed by Kumar Mangalam Birla’s media empire, has announced his departure after nearly nine years at the helm, closing the chapter on one of Indian entertainment’s more quietly consequential careers.
Nair, who built Applause from the ground up in its current avatar, oversaw a slate that spanned Indian originals and international adaptations, threading together a hub-and-spoke business model that partnered with streaming platforms, broadcasters and production houses alike. The results were uneven, as they always are in content, but the ambition was not.
In a post on LinkedIn, Nair was generous to his outgoing patron. He thanked Birla for being an “inspirational boss and a great patron of the arts,” and signed off with a cheerful “Au Revoir” and a promise to remain Applause’s biggest cheerleader. Whether that sentiment survives the next chapter remains to be seen.
No successor has been named. Applause Entertainment did not immediately comment.
Nair built the machine. Now someone else has to run it — and in a streaming market that is simultaneously consolidating and convulsing, that is no small ask.
