After one of the biggest pitches of 2010, Airtel, has finally announced its media partner. And it doesn’t come as a surprise to many that Madison Media has retained the business. Madison Media will handle not just the media duties, but also the out-of-home and digital for Airtel. Industry estimates peg the business to be in the vicinity of Rs 350 crore.
There were six agencies in the fray for the business. These included TME (the media agency of Rediffusion Y&R), Starcom MediaVest, Percept, Mediaedge:cia, and Lintas Media Group, besides Madison Media. Some of these agencies went for the pitch along with their OOH outfits, such as Vector, Portland and Aaren Initiative.
Airtel’s Mohit Beotra explained, “As part of the review, we scanned the entire market and evaluated agencies on their infrastructure, current level of expertise and capabilities, as well as past track record and came to the conclusion that Madison, the incumbent agency, had what it takes to best meet our requirements and help us face the challenges that lie ahead of us. We also evaluated other units of Madison World and have decided to place our Outdoor and Digital business too with Madison Media.”
Madison World, which has two outdoor companies – MOMS & Platinum, will set up a dedicated outdoor team within the agency to handle the Airtel outdoor account. Hitherto, the Airtel Outdoor account was with Portland, a unit of GroupM.
On retaining the business, Sam Balsara, Chairman & Managing Director, Madison World, “We are absolutely delighted that those of our clients who, for process reasons or whatever find the need to occasionally scan the market, invariably choose Madison after being reassured that we offer an unbeatable combination of infrastructure, skill sets and technical expertise, bound together by a much admired value system. Airtel is a unique company that has demonstrated that Indian companies can also achieve scale and profitability on the back of innovation, professionalism and determination, and it is a privilege for us to have Airtel as our client.”
Madison Media handles the Airtel account in Sri Lanka too.
