MAM
Madison Media Alpha bags media mandate for Uncle Delivery
Mumbai: Uncle Delivery has appointed Madison Media Alpha, a unit of Madison World, as their official media agency on record. The account was won by Madison after a multi-agency pitch. As the media agency for the brand, the agency will strategize and manage all forms of media, including outdoor, digital, and traditional media.
As a way of empowering small and medium enterprises (SMEs), Uncle Delivery entered the market in 2021. With a mobile and web app, a network of trusted drivers, and a fleet of couriers just a click away, Uncle Delivery is on its way to becoming the fastest on-demand delivery service in India.
Speaking of this association, Uncle Delivery founder & executive director Sourabh Chatterjee said, “As a start-up in a highly competitive on-demand delivery domain, we were looking forward to having an agency as a partner who would not only help us in the execution of different campaigns but also advise us on how to utilise our resources effectively and efficiently. I think Madison has got that perfect understanding of local dimensions and that is helping us a lot, and of course, the association of Sam Balsara and Vishal Chinchankar gives us much more confidence.”
Commenting on this new partnership, Madison Digital & Madison Media Alpha chief executive officer Vishal Chinchankar said, “It is fascinating to me that Uncle Delivery strives to deliver fast and reliably while prioritising the safety of its partners in this competitive market. I’m thrilled to have Uncle Delivery on board and look forward to working with them to deliver innovative and meaningful projects.”
MAM
‘You packed my parachute’: Avinash Kaul’s farewell salutes Network18’s unsung thousands
The outgoing chief’s LinkedIn post skips the boardroom tributes and goes straight to the security guards, drivers and office boys who kept the machine running
MUMBAI: Most farewell posts by senior media executives follow a familiar script: gratitude to leadership, a nod to the team, a hint of what lies ahead. Avinash Kaul’s is not that post.
Writing on LinkedIn on his last day at Network18 Media & Investments, where he spent nearly 12 years rising to chief executive, Kaul bypassed the boardroom entirely and directed his most heartfelt words at the people furthest from it: the security guard who greeted him before the building was fully awake, the fleet staff who drove him to airports at ungodly hours, the office assistants, the housekeeping teams, and the administrators who, as he put it, “held ten thousand invisible threads so the rest of us could look organised.”
“You packed my parachute,” he wrote. “Every day. Without fanfare, recognition, or ever asking for it.”
It was a striking note from a man who leaves behind a considerable operational record. Kaul joined Network18 managing three channels and exits with responsibility for 20, alongside a publishing business, a growing connected television footprint, and what he says is the highest revenue and highest channel share in the group’s history. He was quick to deflect the credit. “Not because of me. Because of 4,000 people who showed up, every day, in every department, across the country.”
To content teams across India, he issued a reminder that carries some weight given the pressures Indian news media currently faces. “Keep being custodians of trust for 700 million people. That is not a small thing. That is the whole thing.”
To colleagues in revenue and ratings who found him relentless and hard to satisfy, he was unapologetic but generous. “There was never a single moment of ill intent in my heart. Everything I pushed you towards came from one belief – that you were stronger than you knew, and I was not willing to let you settle for less than your real capability.” Those who believed him, he said, flew. Those who did not taught him to be a better communicator. He was grateful to both.
On what comes next, he offered a hint wrapped in metaphor. Something is being built, he said, prepared for “the way you pack a bag before a long climb. Not out of restlessness. Out of readiness.”
In a media landscape that rarely pauses to acknowledge the people who keep the lights on, it was, at the very least, a different kind of goodbye.
