MAM
Kotak banks on dentsu X for fresh media strategy across all platforms
MUMBAI: When Kotak Mahindra Group went shopping for a new media partner, Dentsu X India cashed in. After a tightly contested multi-agency pitch, the banking and financial services giant has handed over its integrated media mandate to Dentsu X, which will service the account from its Mumbai office.
The win is no small deal Dentsu X will now drive the full-funnel media strategy for all of Kotak’s key businesses, including Kotak Mahindra Bank, Kotak Mutual Fund, Kotak Securities, and Kotak Life Insurance. The scope spans the big four channels television, print, radio, and digital branding ensuring the bank’s message cuts across audiences, platforms, and generations.
Known for blending tech, culture, and data to reimagine customer experiences, Dentsu X promises to deliver “outcome-driven solutions” that accelerate Kotak’s marketing and business ambitions. With India’s banking sector doubling down on digital transformation, the collaboration aims to make finance not just accessible, but engaging for the country’s increasingly aspirational consumer base.
Dentsu X India CEO Sujata Dwibedy, called the mandate a “strong testament” to the agency’s agility and integrated offering: “We are truly honoured to partner with a legacy brand like Kotak Mahindra Group. Our future-facing approach will help drive stronger visibility, engagement, and impact across platforms.”
For Kotak, it’s more than just a media deal, it’s about banking on storytelling that resonates in an always-on, attention-fractured world.
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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.
