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Keep up with all the key people movements in the brand marketing ecosystem in Storyboard18’s CXO Moves. Here’s a round-up of the executives who are in, out, and in-between in the past two weeks.

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Rajneet Kohli

Previous: President and Chief Business Officer, Domino's India

Present: Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer, Britannia Industries

Britannia Industries has appointed Rajneet Kohli as the executive director and chief executive officer, effective from September 26. Kohli's appointment to a newly created position of CEO at Britannia, comes at a time when the industry is grappling with margin concerns amid soaring inflation. Kohli, who has more than two decades of experience, has worked with Asian Paints and The Coca-Cola Company, in the past. He will report to Varun Berry, who was elevated to the executive vice-chairman and managing director of the foods major.

Vishal Jacob

Previous: Vice President, Wavemaker India

Present: Chief Transformation Officer and Chief Digital Officer, Wavemaker

GroupM-owned Wavemaker has designated Vishal Jacob as the chief transformation officer. Along with this new position, he will also continue to hold the position of the chief digital officer. In this extended role, Jacob will work with office heads and business leads to structure and create diverse skill sets within business teams to manage current and future business requirements. He will also work along with practice leads to break silos and create more cross functional teams to deliver unified solutions to clients, which is one of Wavemaker’s key focus areas. Further, Jacob will also work on strengthening existing capabilities beyond digital and incubating new ones. In his previous stints, Jacob has worked with Mindshare and Maxus. 

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Burzin Mehta

Previous: National Creative Director, Publicis Worldwide

Present: Chief Creative Officer, Gozoop Group

Independent marketing group Gozoop Group appointed Burzin Mehta as the chief creative officer. Mehta will partner with Samrat Bedi, the chief executive officer to focus on building brands of the future. Mehta, who has more than two decades of experience has worked across Ogilvy, Raka Advertising, DDB Mudra Group, Abans Group Sri Lanka and Indigo Consulting. 

Priya Gurnani and Arvind Menon

Previous: Senior Creative Directors, BBH India

Present: Executive Creative Directors, BBH India

BBH India, which is a part of Publicis Groupe, has promoted Priya Gurnani and Arvind Menon to executive creative directors. Gurnani, who has more than a decade’s experience, has worked across Ogilvy & Mather, Contract Advertising, Leo Burnett, McCann Worldgroup, Amber Communications, Qrious Digital Marketing and Publicis. Menon has worked with PHD Worldwide and FoxyMoron, in the past. 

Two weeks ago, BBH India elevated Radhika Burman to VP, Head Delhi. In her new role, Burman would be responsible for current clients, people, and new business performance in Delhi. Along with that, she will drive strategic thinking across clients.

Abhishek Sen

Previous: Senior Vice President - Integrated Campaigns, Cheil India 

Present: Not known

Abhishek Sen has stepped down from his position as the senior vice president of integrated campaigns at Cheil India. At Cheil India, he led the 360 integrated campaigns across ATL (Above the Line), BTL (Below the Line), digital, social, influencer, publishers, events, e-commerce and community marketing for Samsung India's MX portfolio across smartphones, computing, wearables and community marketing. Sen has more than two decades of experience, and he has worked with agencies such as Rediffusion Y&R, Dentsu, Ogilvy & Mather and DDB. In May, Cheil India had appointed Umesh Bopche as the chief executive officer for its digital agency Experience Commerce.

Sharad Sharma

Present: Chief Business Officer, Boddess Beauty

Multi-brand beauty and tech retailer Boddess Beauty has appointed Sharad Sharma as the chief business officer. In this role, Sharma will be responsible for building and expanding the brand across online and omni channel and hyper-local models across the nation. Sharma, who has 25 years of experience in e-commerce, retail, business consulting and digital marketing, will play a key role in the expansion of the brand in tier 2 and tier 3 markets. Sharma held leadership roles in companies such as Havells, Welspun, Tata Consultancy Service (TCS) and Times Internet.

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Amlan Pati

Previous: Head E-Commerce, D2C and Digital Marketing, CavinKare

Present: Senior Professional - Product Marketing (IM Biz), Samsung Electronics

Samsung Electronics has appointed Amlan Pati to the position of a senior professional - product marketing. As he announced his new position at Samsung Electronics, he added, “Will be working on the flagship smartphones product range.” Pati, who has 10 years of experience has worked across Panasonic India, realme, etc. At CavinKare, Pati was instrumental in launching the D2C business and the first D2C brand Buds and Berries. 

Renu Somani

Previous: Executive Creative Director, Thought Blurb Communications

Present: National Creative Director, Thought Blurb Communications

Full-service advertising and design agency Thought Blurb Communications has elevated Renu Somani to the position of a national creative director. Somani, who has two decades of experience has worked with McCann Erickson and Saatchi & Saatchi in the past. Somani now takes charge of managing the creative product of the company that has a presence in Mumbai and Kochi. She will be overseeing a diverse team of creative talent in these cities, helping in the development of brands across the country and also in planning the creative strategy for new clients here on.

Asheesh Malhotra

Previous: Executive Vice President, Branch head, Dentsu Aegis Network

Present: Executive Director, NEXT

NEXT by Rediffusion, an agency with focus on startups, fintech, e-commerce, edtech, and eHealth, has appointed Asheesh Malhotra as the executive director. Malhotra, who has 25 years of experience in the advertising industry, has worked with Lowe Lintas, Ogilvy & Mather and Bates CHI&Partners. 

Mausami Prasad

Previous: Executive Vice President, Kantar

Present: National Head - Strategy & Insights, Mindshare 

Mindshare has appointed Mausami Prasad as the national head - strategy and insights. In her new role, Prasad will be responsible for contributing to Mindshare’s ‘good growth’ journey by creating exclusive strategies for clients. Prasad, who has more than two decades of experience, has worked across Indica Research, IMRB International, Pantaloon Retail India Ltd and Colgate Palmolive India Ltd etc. At Kantar, Prasad developed client relationships for a global account, consulted client stakeholders and provided consumer insights across the entire brand portfolio of clients. Few days ago, Mindshare strengthened its leadership team by appointing Sam Thomas as head – performance and product, Rehan Ali as Partner – Performance (North and East), Atishay Agrawal as senior director – performance (South), and Pratishtha Dehariya as partner – performance (West).

Rakesh Varma and Abhay Godbole

Present: Vice President & Executive Business Director; Vice President & Client Servicing Director, Wunderman Thompson

Wunderman Thompson has appointed Rakesh Varma and Abhay Godbole. Varma has over 15 years of advertising experience and has been associated with leading brands like Hotstar, Radio City, FBB, Gelusil and Tata AIA, amongst others. Godbole, who has previously worked with Wunderman Thompson Mumbai, during his previous stint with the agency, was instrumental in leading the much lauded ‘Mutual Funds Sahi Hai’ for AMFI. He has close to two decades of experience in marketing communications working across FMCG, Automobile and BFSI. Varma and Godbole will report to Anurag Tandon, managing partner, Wunderman Thompson Mumbai.

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Bhawana Sharma

Previous: Digital Marketing Lead, realme India 

Present: Head of Digital Marketing, CavinKare

FMCG company CavinKare has roped in Bhawana Sharma as the head of digital marketing. Sharma, who has more than a decade’s experience, has worked with HCL Technologies, Cheil India and Hakuhodo, in the past. 

Manesh Mahatme

Previous: Director & Head of WhatsApp Pay, WhatsApp

Present: Director of Product, E-Commerce, Amazon

Manesh Mahatme, who served as the director and head of WhatsApp Pay at the Meta-owned instant messaging platform, has joined Amazon as the director of product for the e-commerce division. As per a media report, his exit comes at a time when WhatsApp is seeking to ramp up its payments service and compete with established brands like Alphabet Inc's Google Pay, Ant Group-backed Paytm and Walmart's PhonePe. Mahatme, who has more than 10 years of experience has worked with Citibank, Mashreqbank and Airtel, in the past. 

Pallavi Mohan

Previous: General Manager, DLF Limited

Present: Head of Marketing and Communications, Elan Group

Real estate company Elan Group has appointed Pallavi Mohan as the head of marketing and communications. Mohan, who has an experience of more than two decades, has worked with Philips Lighting, Britannia Industries Limited, Target, Cafe Coffee Day, Papa John’s International, Royal Orchids Hotel and Samsung Electronics. Mohan has worked across functions like social/digital marketing, sales, business operations, strategic retail, corporate communication, public relations and corporate social responsibility. 

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Girish Menon

Previous: Partner, KPMG India

Present: Chief Strategy Officer, JetSynthesys

Digital entertainment and technology company JetSynthesys strengthened its leadership team through the appointment of Girish Menon. The other appointments are Pushan Puri and Sheetal Bapat who joined as chief technology officer and head of social impact initiatives. Menon, who has 25 years of experience, has worked with KPMG, Balaji Telefilms and Grant Thornton India, in the past. Online music education platform Artium Academy entered into a strategic partnership with Global Music Junction — the digital entertainment subsidiary of JetSynthesys and Warner Music India. This is aimed at helping these entities to identify, nurture and scale aspiring talents at the Academy while collectively building on content-creation, artist management, revenue generation, digital monetisation, branding, and sponsorships. In June, it was announced that JetSynthesys is in talks to go public.

Compiled by Kashmeera Sambamurthy

CXO Moves: Britannia gets a CEO; Execs in at Gozoop, Samsung, realme, Rediffusion, Mindshare, CavinKare, JetSynthesys

Independent homegrown advertising firm Rediffusion announced the launch of NEXT by Rediffusion on 15 August. Focused on building advertising solutions for new age companies, the agency will be headquartered in Mumbai, and will over the next 18 months expand to Delhi and Bengaluru.

The company said that the announcement on a chief executive will be made later this month.

In an exclusive interview with Storyboard18, Dr. Sandeep Goyal, managing director of Rediffusion talks about what makes the new agency different, building the team and why Rediffusion is not in the network play.

Edited excerpts.

How will NEXT by Rediffusion be different from other new shops?

The target audience for the agency itself is different – we are going to be talking to new-age companies – companies that define this techade. These will be start-ups, soonicorns and unicorns in edtech, eHealth, fintech, e-sports, and more such domains that are driven by younger consumers and new technologies.

How big is the team and where have you hired people from?

The team is still coming together. The CEO has been identified. He will be on board very soon. Interestingly, we have planned on on-boarding talent with post grad degrees in sociology, psychology, anthropology and philosophy. Also English Literature and Hindi Literature. The HR team is also in touch with a few IIT-ians to be our coders and data scientists. All of these are folks who normally you don’t meet in ad agencies.

What's the long term strategy at Rediffusion and the new agency? Is it a network play?

No network play – we have no such ambitions or illusions! This is just a very sharply focused agency targeting a market that needs different talents, different perspectives. We believe a lot of the new-age companies are very tech-driven as most have engineers at the controls.
<blockquote>What they increasingly need, as businesses balloon in size, are market accelerating ideas that will bring in more consumers quicker and in larger numbers. " - Sandeep Goyal</blockquote>
Most domains are new. Hence, no past best practices exist, NEXT by Rediffusion will operate within this well defined domain.

What kind of unique solutions NEXT is expected to deliver to its clients?

To early to say. But we will have coders sitting alongside copywriters. That says it all.

We will have coders sitting alongside copywriters: Sandeep Goyal on NEXT

Truecaller and Wavemaker

GroupM-owned Wavemaker India bagged Swedish caller identification app Truecaller's business after a competitive multi-agency pitch. India is the largest market for Truecaller. With over 220 million active users, the country accounts for as much as 70 percent of Truecaller’s global active user base of 300 million. India also accounts for a large part of the company's workforce. Wavemaker in India has been on a roll. It added a total billing of Rs 1500 crore in the last two years. The agency, which counts Mindshare, MediaCom and Essence as media stablemates, also beat all competing agencies to bag ‘Agency Of The Year’ at the Emvies this year. 

Roposo and BBH India

Publicis Groupe’s BBH India has been roped in by Roposo, video-sharing social media service as the Agency On Record (AOR). The account was won following a multi-agency pitch. BBH India will now develop both consumer-focused and business-driven marketing campaigns. Together, Roposo and BBH will develop integrated creative and strategic communications. The partnership comes at a time when Roposo is enhancing its consumer experiences and expanding its marketing efforts for LIVE Shopping and entertainment. Recently, the agency appointed George Sebastian as the executive reactive director, and the agency’s former managing director Arvind Krishnan teamed up with Leo Burnett’s Prajato Guha, former national creative director, to launch a new agency Manja that aims to create full funnel answers to help power brands in the digital world.

Madhur Sagar and Big Trunk Communications

Sugar brand Madhur Sugar has awarded the digital mandate to Big Trunk Communications, a digital integrated marketing agency. Through this collaboration, the aim is to strategically drive and execute an effective 360 degree digital marketing campaign in order to create brand awareness for the company. In November, Big Trunk Communications won the SEO mandate for Aster Labs, national reference laboratory network following a multi agency pitch.

Tata 1mg and Dentsu

Media agency from Dentsu International India, Dentsu X won the media mandate for Tata 1mg, the digital healthcare platform. The account, which would be managed by the agency’s Gurugram office, as per the mandate, will oversee the brand’s planning and buying duties for traditional as well as digital media. Tata 1mg announced complimentary health checkups for more than 1,000 doctors across India.

Nikon India and Magnon eg+

Nikon India, a 100% subsidiary of Nikon Corporation, awarded its creative and digital mandate to magnon eg+---part of the magnon group—a leading marketing performance agency. The account was won after a multi-agency pitch and will be managed by the agency's Delhi NCR office.

magnon eg+ will be responsible for the creative strategy and execution across online and offline platforms. It also includes strategizing and executing influencer and creator-led content. Further, the agency’s focus will be to partner closely with the team at Nikon to further build and strengthen equity for the brand, and manage the entire portfolio of their imaging products.

Garden Vareli and Rediffusion

Garden Silk Mills owned Garden Vareli awarded its communication mandate consisting of creative, media and digital to independent full-service advertising agency Rediffusion. The account, which was won after a multi-agency pitch, will be handled by the agency’s Mumbai office. Recently, Rediffusion appointed Rahul Vengalil as the executive director of Everest Brand Solutions.
 
Kohler India and Efficacy Worldwide 

Full-service marketing agency Efficacy Worldwide became the agency of record (AOR) for luxury sanitary brand Kohler India. The brand said the association would add fresh perspective to the brand’s advertising and marketing strategies.

PepsiCo and Publicis Media

Multinational food, snack and beverage corporation PepsiCo awarded its Rs 600 crore media mandate to Publicis Media, part of Publicis Groupe. The account was won following a multi agency pitch and with this move PepsiCo India has consolidated its media, creative and digital business with Publicis Groupe.

Yellow and Sephora India

Yellow, an integrated global creative agency, has announced the acquisition of global cosmetic retail giant, Sephora. The agency will be responsible for the brand's online and offline communications, including social media, celebrity campaigns and e-commerce. The agency will work on the brand's creative marketing and digital footprint provisions across the country. 

Infectious Advertising and Bayer

Infectious Advertising won the creative mandate of five brands of pharmaceutical company Bayer. The account, which was won after a competitive pitch, will see the agency strategise and deploy creative campaigns for the brands like Arize, Dekalb, Laudis, Native and Vayego. 

Madison Media Ultra and 88Guru.com

Madison Media Ultra became the media agency of record (AOR) of educational website 88Guru.com, where they handle traditional media and digital mandates. 88tuition is a Singapore-based firm that aims to provide students high quality learning experience. The company is set to launch in India under the brand name 88Guru.com.

The Glitch and OLX Auto

The Glitch has been appointed as the global car marketplace OLX Autos’ agency of record (AOR). Having won the account after a competitive pitch, it will be handled out of the agency’s Delhi office. 

Wunderman Thompson India and Cera

Wunderman Thompson India won the creative mandate for sanitaryware brand Cera after a multi-agency pitch. Its responsibility would be to help the sanitaryware brand come up with a new mission and outlook to help connect with the millennials.

Rediffusion and Tata Power 

Rediffusion won the digital, creative and media mandate of Tata Power. This includes all its business clusters including generation, transmission and distribution, renewables and new services including ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance - I think) and CSR domains. The mandate was won following a multi-agency pitch. Previously, Wunderman Thompson looked after the creative aspects of Tata Power, and the mandate of the media duties were fulfilled by GroupM’s m/SIX. Rediffusion also won the account of Garden Vareli, Tynor (largest manufacturer and exporter of orthotics) and Glucon-D (glucose powder brand). 

Havas Media Group India and Slurrp Farm

Havas Media Group won the integrated media mandate of Slurrp Farm, a millet-based children’s food brand. The mandate includes both offline and online media duties, and will be handled out of the agency’s Gurgaon office. Earlier this summer, the brand launched its first-ever brand campaign, ‘Yes Ka Time Aa Gaya’ that featured investor and brand ambassador, actor Anushka Sharma. Two weeks ago, the advertising conglomerate launched Cake, an agency with its concentrations on sport, culture and entertainment.

iProspect India and Monster.com

Dentsu India’s iProspect India has won the digital mandate for the global employment website Monster.com. The account was won following a multi agency pitch and would be handled out of the agency’s Gurgaon office. The agency’s focus would be on performance marketing, and would manage the brand throughout India, Southeast Asia and the Middle East. 
 
Gozoop Group and Spexmojo

Integrated marketing solutions agency Gozoop Group has won the social media mandate of Spexmojo, an online eyewear discovery platform. Having won the account after a multi-agency pitch, the brand would be handled by the agency’s Mumbai office. The focus of the agency would be on the management of the brand, which includes monitoring, listening, responding to queries and reporting to users online. Further, the agency will also focus on creating content on Instagram, Facebook, and on Twitter.

Duroflex and Vector Brand Solutions

Brand and communications consultancy Vector Brand Solutions has won the brand and communications mandate of sleep solutions company Duroflex. The agency’s responsibility would include brand building and communication development across formats, platforms and channels for the company. Recently, Duroflex released an ad starring actor Alia Bhatt who was seen advocating to buy expert-approved mattresses. The TVC was created by Tilt Brand Solutions.

MullenLowe Lintas and Vadilal Ice Creams

Marketing communications company MullenLowe Lintas has been appointed as the creative agency for Vadilal Ice Creams, ice cream brand. The agency will be responsible for Vadilal Ice Creams’ creative mandate for international business.

WatConsult and OLX Autos

Digital marketing agency WatConsult bagged the online reputation management and social listening mandate for digital automotive solutions provider, OLX Autos. The account was won following a multi-agency pitch, and will be managed by the agency’s Mumbai office. As per the mandate, WATConsult will be in charge of response management of the brand, which includes monitoring, listening, responding to queries and reporting to users online.

Absolute Barbecues and Schbang

Barbecue buffet restaurant Absolute Barbecues has awarded its digital mandate to marketing solutions agency Schbang, to increase engagement with its repeat customers and potential customers. In January, Schbang had bagged the digital creative and media mandates for CavinKare's Spinz, Nyle and Chik. The accounts that were won following a multi-agency pitch. The agency’s mandate would be to handle the strategic content and design across all social media platforms as well as performance media for the brands. 

Tally Solutions and Social Panga

Enterprise resource planning company Tally Solutions has appointed digital marketing agency Social Panga as its social media marketing partner. The mandate involves fulfilling the brand’s objective of establishing greater connect and engagement across customer and segment profiles. In May, Social Panga—which had established its presence in Bengaluru and Delhi/NCR—completed one year of its operations in Mumbai.

upGrad Placements and Olevea

The placement arm of edtech major, upGrad has awarded the social and digital mandate to Olevea, a marketing and advertising agency. The agency’s mandate would include assisting upGrad Placements by strategising, conceptualizing, and managing their social and digital media presence.

RenewBuy and Maverick India

Maverick India, an integrated marketing communication creative advertising agency has bagged the digital and creative solutions mandate for RenewBuy, an online insurance distribution platform. Maverick India’s responsibility would include bringing a fresh set of ideas to achieve the brand’s objective of achieving better engagement across their B2B channels. Recently, RenewBuy appointed Nishant Mehta as the chief business officer where he would be responsible for driving new growth avenues for the firm's insurtech business model. And in February, RenewBuy acquired Bengaluru-based fintech start-up Artivatic.AI in order to scale up business and improve technology solutions.

Kingfisher Premium and Kingfisher Ultra, and Zoo Media Network

Kingfisher has given its creative and branded content duties for its flagship products Kingfisher Premium and Kingfisher Ultra to multiple agencies within the Zoo Media Network. The mandate was won by Foxymoron following a multi agency pitch. The business will be handled by the agency’s Gurgaon office. The branded content mandate was won by Rabbit Hole, a video content solutions agency that would be handled by the agency’s Mumbai headquarters.

Biz Moves: BBH, Rediffusion, Schbang, Publicis, Wavemaker, Social Panga & Dentsu win big accounts

REDIFFUSION