MAM
Sagar Kadam joins JioStar as senior director – ecosystem partnerships
Veteran from SonyLiv takes charge of subscription and ecosystem growth for JioHotstar from January 2026.
MUMBAI: Sagar Kadam just switched teams in the OTT big leagues because when you’re this good at partnerships, even the streaming giants line up to sign you. Sagar Kadam has joined JioStar as senior director for ecosystem & subscription partnerships for the digital venture (JioHotstar), effective January 2026. In his new role in Mumbai, he will focus on building and scaling subscription revenue, ecosystem alliances, and strategic partnerships across telcos, banks, ISPs, connected devices, e-commerce, fintech, gifting, rewards, loyalty channels, and more.
Kadam brings deep experience in digital growth and monetisation. He most recently served as associate vice president for partnerships, growth and monetization at Sony Pictures Networks India (SonyLiv) from October 2021 to January 2026, where he drove subscription revenue through partnerships and business development. Before that, he was associate director for partnerships, growth and monetization at Zee5 (April 2019–October 2021).
His earlier career includes nearly nine years at Shemaroo Entertainment (2010–2019) in various business development roles, a stint at I-Free (2008–2010) as manager for content & alliances, and an early position at Enable Mobile Technologies (2007–2008).
Kadam holds an MBA in Marketing from ITM Group of Institutions (2011–2013).
His move to JioStar comes as the merged entity ramps up its push in India’s booming streaming market, where ecosystem partnerships and subscription strategies are key to capturing and retaining users. For someone who’s spent years turning alliances into revenue engines, this role at JioHotstar feels like the perfect next play pairing his partnership playbook with one of the country’s biggest digital platforms. Whether it’s striking telco deals or unlocking fintech tie-ups, Kadam’s arrival signals JioStar is gearing up to make every connection count.
MAM
Stagwell expands Trade Desk tie up to deploy Koa Agents globally
AI agents to automate planning buying optimisation and measurement.
MUMBAI: Media buying may soon need fewer hands on keyboards and more prompts on screens. Stagwell has expanded its global partnership with The Trade Desk, becoming the first global marketing network to adopt Koa Agents, an alpha-stage, agentic AI system designed to overhaul how digital advertising campaigns are run.
At its core, Koa Agents flips the traditional workflow. Instead of manually configuring campaigns step by step, marketers can simply describe their objectives, with AI agents executing, optimising and refining campaigns in real time. Tasks that once took days from audience segmentation to performance analysis are now automated and continuously adjusted as conditions shift.
The integration will connect Koa Agents with Stagwell’s proprietary media ecosystem through The Trade Desk’s Open Agentic Kit, effectively stitching together planning, activation, measurement and optimisation into a single, automated loop.
The first phase of deployment will focus on two key areas. For audience planning, traders can define target segments while Koa Agents identify high-value consumers, activate campaigns across premium inventory and optimise performance dynamically. On the supply side, the system introduces deeper transparency, using quality signals such as ad-to-content ratios and refresh rates to prioritise inventory, while offering clearer visibility into pricing and margins during live campaigns.
The rollout will also introduce a conversational interface, allowing traders to query campaign performance in plain language, why it is underperforming, what is driving results, and what to change receiving real-time, actionable recommendations.
Stagwell plans to make these capabilities available to select clients in a closed beta later this summer, with a broader roadmap aimed at automating the full campaign lifecycle, including setup, troubleshooting and predictive optimisation.
The move builds on an existing partnership between the two companies, including Stagwell’s adoption of Unified ID 2.0, The Trade Desk’s privacy-focused identity framework. Combined with Koa Agents, this is expected to sharpen audience targeting, streamline cross-channel activation and improve measurement accuracy.
As advertising grows more complex behind the scenes, both companies are betting that the front end can become radically simpler where campaigns are less about clicks and controls, and more about outcomes and intent.
