AD Agencies
Dentsu Impact expands its footprint to Bangalore
MUMBAI: Dentsu Impact, the creative agency from Dentsu Aegis Network (DAN) headquartered in Gurgaon, has expanded its footprint to Bangalore. The agency has set up a team of business, creative and strategy leads to run its operations in the city.
While Montu Sangha has been roped in to head business, Amish Sabharwal will head creative. Krittika Chakraborty, meanwhile, has been promoted to head strategy for Dentsu Impact in Bangalore. As part of their new mandate, the trio will not only be in-charge of the existing businesses at Dentsu Impact, especially IKEA, but will also look at opportunities to expand the agency’s offerings and thus, revenues.
With more than 14 years of experience in the business of communication, Sangha has worked across agencies in consulting and with the marketing teams of global brands such as HP and GE in India and the UK. During her stint with agencies, she has worked on the launch of brands for Unilever and ITC Foods. In her last role, she was the South Asia lead for advertising and promotions in GE Healthcare.
On joining the Dentsu Impact family, Sangha says, “I am very excited and look forward to my new role at Dentsu Impact, Bangalore. It is a great opportunity to partner with an iconic global brand like IKEA for their successful launch in India which is a key market for them. In the coming months, my focus will also be on identifying new areas of growth for Bangalore operations and to build a team that can offer a bouquet of services in the coming years.”
For Sabharwal, this is his second stint with Dentsu Impact. He joins back from JWT where he was taking care of the Pepsi business. There, he was also involved in the revamp of Gatorade and the launch of Sting.
Sabharwal adds, “IKEA is not just another brand. It’s a culture. And it is great to be involved in scripting the India chapter after being an integral part of the pitch team. Both Montu and Krittika are great professionals and human beings to work with, and we will make sure that the impact is both heard and seen. I really thank Amit and Soumitra for the faith that they have shown in us.”
Chakraborty has been with Impact for the last six years. She has nearly a decade of experience across marketing, branding and communication strategy. She has worked for a variety of categories such as automobiles, publications and home furnishings. She has been instrumental in leading strategic thinking on large scale businesses such as Maruti Suzuki and IKEA and is a keen believer in insight mining and storytelling for the digital age.
Commenting on the expansion, in a joint statement, Dentsu Impact president Amit Wadhwa and chief creative officer Soumitra Karnik mention, “We have picked the best talent from inside and outside our organisation to take care of our Bangalore operations and IKEA is a very important part of this. We are sure that with Montu, Amish and Krittika at the helm, we will build a strong statement in the market.”
AD Agencies
Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
