MAM
Isobar’s Graham Kelly to judge Adfest 2014
BANGKOK: Creative leader and entrepreneur Graham Kelly is joining next year’s festival as Jury President of Interactive Lotus and Mobile Lotus.
Kelly is Regional Executive Creative Director at Isobar Asia Pacific, based in Singapore, where he oversees the creative output of 21 offices across 13 markets. Kelly also sits on Isobar’s regional team, working on key multinational accounts and new business development.
“I’m delighted to be joining ADFEST this year. Asia is renowned for ground breaking digital work. Moreover it’s the world’s most dynamic mobile market. So I’m looking forward to seeing some outstanding creative this year,” says Kelly.
Kelly has been Executive Creative Director (ECD) and Regional ECD at some of the world’s leading advertising agencies including Saatchi & Saatchi, Ogilvy, Leo Burnett, BBH and TBWA. He moved to Asia in 1991.
In August 2010, he co-founded GKIM Pte Ltd, a digital ideas start-up that works with agencies, brands and inventors. The company’s 3D colouring app, ‘Color the World’ has earned plaudits and extensive media coverage.
While launching GKIM, Kelly also worked as National ECD for OgilvyOne India until November 2012, joining Isobar as Regional Executive Creative Director, Asia Pacific, six months later.
Kelly’s work has won awards at the world’s most prestigious advertising shows, and he has judged almost every major local show across Asia. He is also a regular speaker at key advertising events. His most recent speeches have centred on how to use digital – in particular, social media – more creatively.
“Graham’s experience transcends the traditional and digital world, which will hold him in good stead as Jury President of the Interactive and Mobile Lotus categories at ADFEST,” says ADFEST President Jimmy Lam.
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.
