MAM
Smartworks launches first brand campaign in India
MUMBAI: Smartworks, provider of shared workspaces, has launched its brand with the tagline ‘Workspaces That Work for You’ through its new video campaign. Smartworks aspires to reinvent India’s workspaces with a simple motto – “Create office spaces where people ‘want’ to go, not just ‘have’ to go!” Smartworks currently has over 7,00,000 square feet of best-in-class, bespoke shared workspaces. The company’s operations span 14 centres in nine tier 1 cities across the country.
Smartworks has assigned a robust budget of approximately 50 lakh covering outdoor, digital and print advertisements to be rolled out as the young brand steps into its second year of operations in 2018. The campaign leads with a series of three social media brand videos showcasing the value proposition that it provides to its customers, i.e., hassle free work spaces, highly customised, personalised offices and technology-rich environments.
Smartworks founder Neetish Sarda mentions, “Exposure to future workspaces and high employee engagement levels in US and Singapore across offices like LinkedIn, Microsoft and Google made me evaluate the current status quo in my father’s office in Kolkata and India in general. It made me think why a delightful office experience is inaccessible and costly, available only to elite organisations This led me to radically transform this experience for the new age workforce in India. My visits to traditional offices across India – poor aesthetic design, low employee energy levels, limited flexibility, and dysfunctional employee culture – reinforced my belief that commercial office space needs to be disrupted.”
Bollywood actor Brijendar Kala features in the first brand video which is created as a humorous take on traditional office life. The video was released across the company’s social media handles and has garnered a whopping 500,000 views in just 24 hours.
Smartworks co-founder Harsh Binani says, “Making employees’ happiness it’s Holy Grail, Smartworks, today has become a torchbearer of India’s shared spaces. We measure our success based on employee happiness index and how we have transformed the overall office experience of any Smartworker. Our aim is to build tailor-made offices wherein a company could thrive on qualitative networking opportunities and expand itself while shaping the office as per its own culture and ecosystem in the Smartworks universe. We put great emphasis on the privacy of our clients while connecting them within the community with like-minded professionals.”
Boring Brands co-founder and CEO Anshul Sushil adds, “As Smartworks believes in providing perfectly customised office spaces to its clients, it was a key mandate for us to convey that they will be there for their clients every step of the way. Our strategy was to show something which appeals to the sensibilities of a corporate as well as millennial workforce in the ever changing dynamics of workspaces. Today’s audience looks for commercials which go beyond the conventional and ordinary; they want something to relate to. Keeping this preference in mind, we gave them a slice of life with a comic angle. We want them to instantly connect with the advertisement and know that Smartworks has the solutions to all their office woes.”
MAM
VML India lands two finalist spots at Cairns Hatchlings 2026
The Mumbai agency is back in Australia with two teams, a UN brief and 24 hours to impress
MUMBAI: VML India is heading to Australia again. The Mumbai-based creative agency has secured two finalist spots at the Cairns Hatchlings 2026 competition, one in the Audio category and one in Design, making it the only Indian agency to have reached the finals in both editions of the contest since its launch in 2025.
Four people will make the trip. Senior copywriter Shilpi Dey and senior art director Raj Thakkar will compete in Audio. Art directors Shabbir and Shruti Negi will go head-to-head with the world’s best in Design. The finals take place at the Cairns Convention Centre from 13th May, culminating in an awards ceremony on 15th May.
The work that got them there is worth examining. For the Audio category, Dey and Thakkar tackled a brief for LIVE LIKE MMAD with a campaign called Inner Voice, Interrupted. Using spatial audio techniques, the campaign recreates the overwhelming self-doubt that descends after a long workday, physically panning negative thoughts left and right before cutting the noise entirely to reveal a confident inner voice. Strategically targeted at commuters via Spotify during evening rush hours, the campaign reframes the hours after work as an opportunity for personal growth and charitable action.
For the Design category, Shabbir and Negi worked on a brief for Canteen’s Bandanna Day, a campaign highlighting how cancer pushes teenagers out of their own defining moments. Using a pixelated design language to create stark contrast between a blurred world of isolation and a focused world of connection, the campaign, titled The Flipside of Cancer, shows teenagers fading into the background of birthdays, skateparks and school proms. As a Canteen bandanna appears, the blur flips and the teenager snaps back into sharp focus.
Kalpesh Patankar, group chief creative officer of VML India, made no attempt to disguise his satisfaction. “We are immensely proud to see our teams consistently excel on the Cairns Hatchlings platform since its inception,” he said. “They have masterfully tackled challenging briefs across diverse categories, demonstrating both layered storytelling and a unique creative approach. This exceptional teamwork is truly inspiring.”
Dey and Thakkar, returning to the finals after last year’s run, were candid about the demands of the audio medium. “It’s one of the most demanding mediums, where we only have a few seconds to capture a listener’s world with sound alone, so absolute clarity is essential,” they said. “The true measure of creative work is its ability to create positive change, and our audio submission was made to help those who need it most while encouraging people to silence the inner voices that hold them back.”
Shabbir and Negi, competing in Design for the first time, described the experience as “a completely different beast.” “We see it as an opportunity to showcase our expertise, raise the bar, and challenge ourselves in new ways, while also learning from creative minds from across the globe,” they said.
In Australia, the four finalists will face a live 24-hour brief from the United Nations before presenting in a live pitch session. Twenty-four hours, one brief, one shot. VML India has been here before. It knows exactly what is at stake.
