MAM
SABMiller partners British fencing team for British Olympic Association initiative
MUMBAI: SABMiller plc, has announced that it had partnered with the British fencing team as part of the FTSE – British Olympic Association initiative.
According to an official release, SABMiller will provide skills and resources in support of British Fencing as it develops as an autonomous organization. The objective is that the partnership is to be ongoing up to, and potentially beyond, the London Olympics in 2012.
Projects will vary over time but the initial focus will be on preparing a business plan to 2012. The aim will be to raise the profile of British Fencing, securing sponsorship and putting in place appropriate governance and service provision. SABMiller head of policy and planning Gail Lumsden at will lead on this project.
SABMiller corporate affairs director Sue Clark said, “SABMiller is a business which thrives on competition in all arenas. We are excited and honored to partner with British Fencing and to share in their forthcoming quest for Olympic success.”
British Fencing president Keith Smith said, “British Fencing is delighted to be in a partnership with SABMiller. Access to the skills and resources of this FTSE 100 Company will help us to improve our image, management and performance, as we aim to grow as a sport and to deliver Olympic success in London in 2012. It is good to see this company stepping forward to help an enthusiastic and increasingly successful Olympic sport as we prepare for the excitement and challenges of London 2012. We already have an Under 17 World Champion and a Senior European Championships Silver medallist, and with increased support we hope to reach our full potential before a home crowd in London.”
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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.
