"Within India, Emvies stands out as the only authoritative awards for the media industry."

TIn a conversation with Anushree Madan Mohan of exchange4media, Vikram Sakhuja, Managing Director, Mindshare, discusses how media innovations are becoming bigger and better with time, and how Emvies has raised the bar for the media product. Excerpts:

What is the importance of Emvies vis-a-vis any other awards ceremony?

Within India, Emvies stands out as the only authoritative awards for the media industry. This is quite unlike the advertising and movies scene, inundated by several awards.

How has Emvies evolved with the time?

The function has become bigger with the time. I see media innovations becoming bigger and better.

What kind of a contribution does Emvies make to the media industry?

Ideally, it should raise the bar for the media product. In Mindshare Asia Pacific Awards, the game is to see the new benchmarks that different countries can learn from. It also gives a way to achieve self-actualisation. Agencies live solely for the client’s business. A recognition of inspiration and perspiration that has gone into their client’s business well, it’s a highly gratifying feeling.

What kind of improvisation can be brought within Emvies?

There should be greater alignment on judging criteria. Currently every judge uses his own judgment to score. Also, buying is not directly covered. Given that buying is one of the most critical aspects looked at by the client, we should figure out ways of doing work without breaching confidentiality.

Last time around, there were categories used such as Best Media Innovation and Never Been Used Media. What’s your opinion about these categories?

Best Media Innovation has been around in TV awards and so on. But Never Been Used Media is an interesting category.

Your expectations from Emvies this time around?

Internationally, many of the awards already have these categories. The Never Before Used Media category usually gets very nice entries and genuine innovative stuff.

Your expectations from Emvies this time around?

Raise the standards with some path breaking work. No old wine in a new bottle. Strategies that show strong understanding of business needs and intelligent use of market resources to deliver spectacular results.