MAM
Sameer Aasht moves to Percept H as VP, strategy planning
MUMBAI: Percept H has roped in Sameer Aasht as VP, Strategy Planning. He replaces Sujay Nanavati who quit the agency in December 2010.
Aasht moves in from Rediffusion Y&R, where he was strategic design consultant. He is also the founder of Alma Mater Biz Solutions, an interior consultancy firm, and has been empanelled as design consultant for National Institute of Design‘s micro, small and medium enterprises initiatives.
Says Aasht, “My initial understanding of Percept is that it is one of the few agencies which is future ready and truly understands the potential of young India. Unlike most agencies struggling to crack a conventional campaign in traditional media, Percept is ready to enable paradigm shifts through strategic action and brand innovations.”
In his career spanning nearly a decade, Aasht has worked with agencies such as TBWA India, Publicis Ambience and Contract advertising. He also worked at Jet Airways for two years as international marketing manager.
Aasht has strategised various brands including Jet Airways, HSBC, Nivea, Cadbury’s, Asian Paints, Unilever’s Elle18, Westside, Nerolac, Samsonite and Times of India & Ficci.
MAM
Sameer Nair shares heartfelt note as he exits Applause Entertainment
After nine years building the streamer’s content engine, one of India’s best-known TV men is moving on
MUMBAI: Sameer Nair is out. The chief executive of Applause Entertainment, the content studio backed by Kumar Mangalam Birla’s media empire, has announced his departure after nearly nine years at the helm, closing the chapter on one of Indian entertainment’s more quietly consequential careers.
Nair, who built Applause from the ground up in its current avatar, oversaw a slate that spanned Indian originals and international adaptations, threading together a hub-and-spoke business model that partnered with streaming platforms, broadcasters and production houses alike. The results were uneven, as they always are in content, but the ambition was not.
In a post on LinkedIn, Nair was generous to his outgoing patron. He thanked Birla for being an “inspirational boss and a great patron of the arts,” and signed off with a cheerful “Au Revoir” and a promise to remain Applause’s biggest cheerleader. Whether that sentiment survives the next chapter remains to be seen.
No successor has been named. Applause Entertainment did not immediately comment.
Nair built the machine. Now someone else has to run it — and in a streaming market that is simultaneously consolidating and convulsing, that is no small ask.
