MAM
Madison Media Infinity
Madison Media Infinity is headed by Ajit Varghese in the capacity of CEO. Based out of Mumbai, Varghese looks after the Bangalore office of Madison Media as well. He reports to Madison Media Group CEO Punitha Arumugham.
Clients
Mumbai: Marico, Coca Cola, Dominos, McDonalds, BenQ.
Bangalore: TVS, Tata Tea, IBF, Acer, Indo Nissin.
Madison Media Infinity has a total of 45 – 50 in odd professional across the Mumbai and Bangalore offices. All big accounts have a dedicated team, which focuses on that particular account. In Mumbai, the big accounts are handled by a group of six – eight planners, who are led by an account director. Madison Media Infinity has an overall buying head in Jayalala and hence the agency has central buying support.
When the agency’s client – Coca Cola shifted it headquarters to Delhi recently, the account director who serviced the client, also moved to Delhi. However, this account still falls under Madison Media Infinity and not Madison Media Plus, which is based out of Delhi.
Varghese, who has been with the agency for the last six years, is of the opinion that the reason behind launching the sub-brands was not essentially to go after conflicting clients. “Madison does handle some amount of conflicting clients, but if we had to pitch for a conflicting business, we would first ask our client in the same category, whether it was ok with them. Only if we get a go-ahead from them, do we pitch for the business,” says Varghese.
The strengths of the agency, according to him, are:
The ethics and integrity of the team
Complete and dedicated client focus
Adapting to the ever changing media environment
360 degree offering with its divisions: Madison Creative, MOMS, Mates, MMRC, Madison PR, MRP
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.
