Ad Campaigns
Michelin tyres enters India playing the ‘safety’ card
MUMBAI: Michelin – the international tyre technology leader today announced the launch of its first television commercial in the country. Themed ‘Safely Ahead’ this pan India campaign with the iconic Michelin man will make its debut on Indian television channels soon.
The campaign, which has been produced for Television as well as for digital advertising, will highlight Michelin’s ability to provide safer mobility for motorcyclists and scooter riders thanks to its technological knowhow and its 125-year history of delivering landmark innovations.
The campaign was conceptualized by Publicis India. In Efecto, the French 3D animated film specialist executed the animation.
The campaign centers around three elements that Indian riders negotiate daily while using their motorcycles and scooters:
• Bad roads: dictate the fitment of robust tyres.
• Wet roads: require good grip.
• Braking: stopping ability to minimise braking distances.
During the unveiling of the campaign in Mumbai India, president of Michelin 2 wheel tyre division Gary Guthrie said: “We recognize that the young generation of India today, are always mobile and desire better and safer performance from their bikes. Our Michelin Man, ’Safely Ahead’ campaign illustrates how our two wheel tyres designed specifically for Indian riders, comes with unbeatable all-round safety, road-holding, braking and overall riding pleasure that they expect from Michelin.” He further added, “One of our strategic two wheel growth objective in India is to strengthen our position in one of the fastest growing markets in the world. The ‘Safely Ahead’ campaign is an effort towards achieving this key objective.”
The TV advertisements will be seen on major national cable networks in India that would include general entertainment, movies and sports channels. It will also be aired on major regional channels across the country.
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
