MAM
Optum Global Solutions hires Prasidha Menon as marketing director
NEW DELHI: OYO Hotels & Homes’ former global head of communications Prasidha Menon has joined Optum Global Solutions India as the director – marketing.
In the new role at the UnitedHealth Group-owned company, Menon will be responsible for designing and executing the company’s marketing and communications strategies in alignment with the company’s overall business strategy for the market.
"The company has been at the forefront of several tech innovations in the healthcare space, making it one of the most coveted brands, globally,” said Menon. “What makes it even more exciting is the company’s focus on building a high performing workforce that thrives on values, such as integrity, compassion, relationships, innovation and performance. I sincerely hope to play a pivotal role in the company’s journey hereon."
A seasoned marketing and PR professional with 15+ years of experience, Menon specialises in integrated communications campaigns, with a strong focus on content and creative visualisation, amplified through earned, owned and paid media outlets.
Prior to OYO, Menon was heading communications for Uber in India and South Asia. Menon has also worked with several leading PR agencies in the past, such as Edelman India and Genesis Burson-Marsteller (now known as Genesis BCW).
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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.
