MUMBAI: For GroupM India it was a great way to end 2005. GroupM Bangalore investment director Prasanth Kumar has bagged the 'best media planner/buyer in Asia' award, given by the Hong Kong-based Media Magazine at a function held on 14 December.

 
The Media Magazine awards recognises outstanding work in media planning/ buying, creative, one-to-one, marketing, account/ business developments and many more, across the Asia Pacific region.

Prasanth Kumar has been with GroupM since 2004. Kumar was earlier with TME, Mumbai. He is a key member of GroupM investment team, headed by Lakshmi Narasimhan.

 
 
Kumar oversees buying for key GroupM clients in the south, including Britannia, Titan, Himalaya, Ford, IBM etc.

Among the big media innovations he has helped pull off are the Lenovo computer branding in KBC2, and the Titan-MTV partnership deal that helped launch the Titan-MTV Masala watch collection.

 
 
He won an award for the best use of analytics in media negotiations, for the Britannia case study that he presented in GroupM's regional buying conference in Bangkok earlier this year.

According to a media release, senior managers at GroupM India were delighted with Prasanth's win, as it was a double treat, coming along with Mindshare winning the agency network of the year in Asia Pacific.

GroupM South Asia CEO Ashutosh Srivastava says, " The award for Prasanth is a fantastic recognition for India based media talent".
GroupM India investments head Lakshmi Narasimhan says, "Prasanth typifies the best of GroupM trading with his high energy, never-say-die spirit and rigorous approach. The team at GroupM trading is ecstatic because this is the first time a buyer has been a winner in this category."