AD Agencies
Mullen Lowe Lintas Group India wins its 75th award for the year
Mumbai: Starting with the Effie India 2014 to the recently concluded Campaign South Asia Agency of the Year awards, Mullen Lowe Lintas Group India has won a total of 75 honours last night, making it the most awarded agency in India in 2015. All the 75 awards were won either for market/campaign effectiveness, or on overall agency performance.
The awards list this year includes the group’s performance at Warc Prize for Asian Strategy, where it won a grand prix, a gold, a silver and a bronze. The year culminated for the agency with a fine performance at the Campaign Asia Agency of the Year awards show where it was declared the ‘Best Creative Agency of the Year’, the Best New Business Development Team of the Year, Best Strategic/Brand Planner of the Year and Best Account Person of the Year.
Commenting on the agency’s strong performance on the awards front, Mullen Lowe Lintas India Group CEO, Joseph George said, “It’s been a milestone year for us in India. We are glad to have ended the year on the same high that we started with. All this recognition is a result of all our key people putting up their hands, wanting to be counted and bringing value to the table. And this happened only because everyone thought of themselves as key stakeholders of the company. ”
Adding his views on the agency’s achievement Lowe Lintas India CCO Arun Iyer said, “I’m proud of the consistency with which each of our offices has churned out some great work across a large and diverse client set. Our work has excelled on a portfolio that’s a combination of classical and progressive brands, from young upstarts to large market leaders. 2015 serves as a reminder of how setting the bar high is an everyday pursuit, and how successful teams are greater than the individuals.”
Mullen Lintas India chairman and CCO Amer Jaleel added, “The best barometer of our work being appreciated is when it manages to bring about a shift in perception and thought among the people. That’s what we achieved with few of our brands that went on to redefine the way a campaign should be approached, and which ended up winning awards that were unique in nature. Special accolades for Indian brands such as Havells, Tata Tea and the others were something that no agency had ever received before, and we are proud to have set a trend by being the first.”
Adding his views on the agency’s achievement Lowe Lintas India CCO Arun Iyer said, “I’m proud of the consistency with which each of our offices has churned out some great work across a large and diverse client set. Our work has excelled on a portfolio that’s a combination of classical and progressive brands, from young upstarts to large market leaders. 2015 serves as a reminder of how setting the bar high is an everyday pursuit, and how successful teams are greater than the individuals.”
Mullen Lintas India chairman and CCO Amer Jaleel added, “The best barometer of our work being appreciated is when it manages to bring about a shift in perception and thought among the people. That’s what we achieved with few of our brands that went on to redefine the way a campaign should be approached, and which ended up winning awards that were unique in nature. Special accolades for Indian brands such as Havells, Tata Tea and the others were something that no agency had ever received before, and we are proud to have set a trend by being the first.”
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.
