Ad Campaigns
Draftfcb+Ulka celebrates ‘boyhood’ with Hero
MUMBAI: Hero once again plans to capture the imagination of the youth with its latest commercial, conceptualised by Draftfcb+Ulka, that is a true celebration of ‘boyhood’ with the Hero Maestro – a scooter that’s made for boys.
The idea is to bring out the behaviour of today’s boys and give an enjoyable, light twist and who better to play the role of the quintessential boy than Ranbir Kapoor. Continuing his long standing relationship with Hero, Ranbir brings his inimitable style and incredible talent to this story and makes it more memorable than ever.
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Draftfcb+Ulka Delhi group creative director Sanjay Sharma said, “We wanted to bring out the ‘boyish’ attitude which Maestro stands for in a way that is relevant to the contemporary society. It’s a new dimension – a light hearted take on the way future is dear to the girls and present to the boys.”
The commercial has seen an overwhelming initial response. Draftfcb+Ulka Delhi COO Sanjay Tandon said, “Maestro is a brand built around boyish idiosyncrasies. To further reinforce the positioning success of the brand, Ranbir exudes his boyish charm through a typical “men are from mars. women are from venus” storyline.”
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Adding to this, Draftfcb+Ulka, Delhi VP Sharad Mathur said, “The aim was to play up the ‘boyish’ attitude through the product as well as in a setting which most of the youngsters can easily relate to. Ranbir effortlessly exudes a playful boyish charm which along with the music and setting brings out Maestro’s attitude and its celebration of boyhood.”
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
