MAM
Niranjan Kaushik quits McCann to float Acid with Sameer Desai
MUMBAI: After serving McCann, Mumbai, as senior creative director for two and half years, Niranjan Kaushik has quit the agency to launch Acid Brand Communications (ABC) with Sameer Desai, founder of DesignCode.
Says Kaushik, “It‘s the era of entrepreneurial agencies, thanks to Mark Zuckerberg for setting a fine example. Our effort is to provide clients with top notch creative and strategic thinking minus the fanfare of a multinational set up. Our collective years of experience across industries will help us bring a lot of value to the table.”
Kaushik and Desai have been a team since 1998 at Ogilvy, Mumbai with the duo having worked together on brands like Indian Express, Onida and Samsonite in the past.
Having launched a brand campaign for ISTA Group of Hotels recently, they are currently working on the brand launch for ASK, a wealth management firm.
Kaushik‘s career spans over 13 years, across agencies like Ogilvy, Batey Singapore, LHM Singapore, Contract Mumbai and McCann Mumbai. Over the years, he has worked on brands like HSBC, Asian Paints, Shoppers‘ Stop, Mercedes Singapore, Singapore Tourism Board, Singapore Airlines, Disney, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Loreal.
Over a career spanning 17 years, Desai has worked with agencies like DaCunha, Lowe, Ogilvy, Ambience Publicis and Contract before setting up Design Code. He has worked on brands like Park Avenue, Marico Industries, HSBC, Shoppers Stop and Asian Paints.
MAM
JioStar unveils ‘The Winning Edge’ playbook for live cricket advertisers
Data-led guide shows multi-screen, sponsorship strategies drive higher impact
MUMBAI: JioStar has launched ‘The Winning Edge’, a data-backed advertising playbook aimed at helping brands maximise impact on live cricket, positioning the sport as one of the most powerful marketing platforms in India.
Built using billions of impression-level data points across marquee cricket properties and validated through studies by Kantar, the playbook offers practical insights into how brands can drive measurable outcomes such as awareness, recall and purchase intent.
The findings make a strong case for live cricket as a growth engine for both new and established brands. According to the report, new advertisers on live cricket campaigns saw up to 6.9 times higher brand awareness and up to 10.8 times higher purchase intent compared to industry benchmarks. Established brands also recorded gains, with up to four times higher awareness and nearly five times higher purchase intent.
Speaking about the initiative, JioStar head of sales sports Anup Govindan said, “The Winning Edge, developed in partnership with Kantar, is built on rigorous, data-backed analysis of how real brands have performed on our platform across categories, objectives, budgets, formats and tournament phases. The study reaffirms that when it comes to driving real outcomes such as awareness, consideration and purchase intent, nothing matches the intensity, scale and impact of live cricket. The depth of attention and emotional engagement during live moments creates a multiplier effect that non-live environments simply cannot replicate.”
One of the standout insights is the advantage of multi-screen strategies. Campaigns that ran simultaneously across linear TV, connected TV and mobile delivered up to seven times higher purchase intent than single-platform campaigns, with minimal audience overlap ensuring incremental reach.
The playbook also highlights the impact of combining formats. Brands using both video and display formats saw up to 7.4 times higher brand awareness compared to those relying on video alone.
Sponsorships emerged as another key lever. Brands with formal sponsorship deals recorded up to nine times higher purchase intent and up to eight times higher ad awareness than those opting only for standard inventory buys. Adding pre and post live studio programming further boosted aided awareness by up to 2.1 times.
Crucially, the report identifies high-impact in-match moments such as Super 4s, Super 6s, DRS and fall of wickets as prime opportunities for brands. Campaigns aligned with these moments delivered uplifts of up to 10 times in awareness and up to seven times in recall, reinforcing the value of contextual advertising.
Echoing these findings, Kantar managing director and chief client & solutions officer Soumya Mohanty said, “Numerous Kantar Brand Lift Studies have demonstrated the incremental impact of live cricket advertising, with results consistently ranking at the top end of Kantar’s Brand Lift database. This playbook distils those insights into actionable media planning and creative recommendations to help advertisers drive stronger outcomes in live cricket environments.”
With live cricket continuing to draw massive, highly engaged audiences, JioStar is positioning ‘The Winning Edge’ as a blueprint for brands looking to move beyond visibility and towards measurable impact.
As the competition for consumer attention intensifies, the message is clear. In the world of sports marketing, playing smart may matter just as much as showing up.
