Publicis Groupe announced today that it had appointed Ajit Gurnani as Chief Business Development Officer for South Asia. In his new role, he will enhance new business offerings, strengthen client relationships, and accelerate growth for the Groupe and its clients. He will also drive greater synergies, and connectivity across Groupe agencies, solution hubs, and Practices for increased client value and maximum business results. He will work closely with Anupriya Acharya, CEO Publicis Groupe South Asia in this mandate. Publicis Media India has been leading in new business rankings in the last couple of years.

Gurnani takes on this role in addition to his current role as Chief Growth Officer, Publicis Media Services, India wherein he works closely with Tanmay Mohanty, Chief Executive, of Publicis Media Services India. In his current role, he has helmed critical global and local pitches, and been instrumental in enabling some of the key media wins of 2022 – PepsiCo, LG Digital, and Eureka Forbes among others, working closely with the media services teams.

Gurnani has been with Groupe for nearly 8 years now across various roles in Zenith and Publicis Media. Apart from the agency and media experience he gained through leadership roles in leading media networks, he also brings a wide spectrum of client-side experience from his stint at Marico and others.

Anupriya Acharya says “This role is a vital one for the Groupe and is aimed at further solidifying partnerships with clients and keeping up our pace of new business momentum. Ajit is a seasoned leader that brings remarkable perspective, depth, and dimension to every brand conversation and from across various vantage points. His vast experience across categories, businesses and working with multi-disciplinary teams is an added asset.”

Ajit Gurnani said, “I am thrilled at the opportunity. Publicis Groupe South Asia has been performing spectacularly on new business and future-facing capabilities and I look forward to my part in elevating its position further, and bringing in new partnerships, connections, and surefire growth. Publicis Power of One model is very powerful, and I hope to leverage it fully to unlock tangible value for the Groupe and its clients.”

Consumer insights expert Ritika Goswami has joined the branding & marketing agency dentsu X as Vice President, Strategy. Goswami announced the news on LinkedIn.

Previously, she was the Associate Director at NielsenIQ for four years. She also worked with Kantar as Group Account Director prior to that.

Goswami is a consumer insight professional and a branding expert based in Delhi with over 16 years of work experience.

She specialises in solving branding issues through consumer psychology and unravelling motivation. According to her LinkedIn profile, she has recently forayed into Media Strategy.

Former Kellogg India's Chief Marketing Officer Sumit Mathur has joined payment platform Paytm. Mathur announced on LinkedIn: "Nothing’s more exciting for a marketeer than the opportunity to literally touch the lives of every Indian and every merchant. Super excited to kickstart my own journey with Paytm and make #harpaymentdigital."

Back in February, Mathur announced that he has moved on from Kellogg India after more than five and a half years with the company. He shared the news through a LinkedIn post. "This week’s my last serving bowls of Kellogg’s… a journey I cherish & feel proud of," he wrote.

Mathur joined Kellogg India in 2017 as the Director of Marketing. He was in charge of leading the overall Category Strategy/Vision & Business P&L as part of the South Asia Leadership Team.

Prior to that, Mathur was associated with Hindustan Unilever Limited for close to 15 years. He led the India Ice-cream business with overall P&L ownership and direct functional responsibility for Marketing, Sales, Shopper/Trade marketing and Cold Chain Logistics.
The IIM Calcutta alumnus is also a member of Consumer Complaints, ASCI and Co-Chair Marketing Leadership Committee, Confederation of Indian Industry.

Vaibhav Ajmera has joined Liqvd Asia as Director - Business & Services, and will be heading the agency’s south India operations. Vaibhav is a digital marketing enthusiast and brings with him a decade of experience in building brand persona on digital platforms.

At Liqvd Asia, Vaibhav will be responsible for upscaling digital offerings in Bangalore. He will also be implementing new-age strategies, and tools in order to create solutions for brands.

Monish Shanghavi, Head of Business & Services, Liqvd Asia, said on the development, “We welcome Vaibhav Ajmera to the Liqvd Asia fold. His formidable experience across brands and sectors should stand us in good stead. We look forward to Vaibhav playing a key role in the company charting a smart growth, going forward.”

Prior to Liqvd Asia, he worked with some of the most prestigious brands in the country, as well as sectors like BFSI, Fintech, Automobile, IT Sports, Healthcare, Apparel, FMCG, Fashion, and Beauty.

Commenting on the appointment, Vaibhav Ajmera, Director – Business and Services, Liqvd Asia, said, “I am excited to be joining this company at this juncture of its growth. Bangalore is key to the growth of the company. I see a bright future for Liqvd Asia in the background of an expanding economy of the country Considering the fact that this is my second stint here I look forward to take the business forward to a newer height.”

An inquisitive digital marketing professional, Vaibhav has worked with well-known brands like Mumbai Indians, Tata Sky, Discovery Channel, Animal Planet Channel, Eurosport Channel, London Dairy, Tata Power, Tata Nexarc, Parle, PUMA, Allen Solly, Peter England, F21, American Eagle, Living Foodz Channel, TVS Raider, Starcity+, Jupiter, Sport, IQube and many more.

Mullen Lintas has appointed Ram Jayaraman of Meta as the new Chief Creative Officer (CCO).

Ram Jayaraman, better known as Ram Cobain, joins Mullen Lintas from Meta’s Creative Shop, where he was a Creative Strategist for over six years. His time at Meta has been creatively rich and full of learning across all its platforms, including Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger.

Ram will report to Subbu, as he takes on the role previously held by Garima Khandelwal. Garima has decided to move on and will be announcing her next move shortly.

With over 22 years of experience in the industry, Jayaraman is a renowned and celebrated creative leader who has worked with some of the world's leading brands. Prior to Meta, Ram spent over 15 years at leading agencies such as Wunderman Thompson and Grey Worldwide, playing leadership roles in Creative and working on a diverse set of brands like Pepsi, Dell, Unilever, Nestle, GSK, ESPN Star Sports, 3M, Sony, Hero, ITC, Britannia, Fortis, and Set MAX, amongst others.

Commenting on Ram’s appointment, S. Subramanyeswar (Subbu), Group CEO – India & Chief Strategy Officer – APAC MullenLowe Group said, “In our fierce quest to become a digital-first brand building company, we wanted to place some bold bets on the kind of creative leader who could come on board to lead our decisive agenda at Mullen Lintas. In Ram, we found a partner whose idea of technology for humanity – how humans will interact with experiences that span a multitude of devices and senses, and the creative possibilities those lend in the fiery cauldron of quantum or fifth paradigm of marketing impressed us the most. He is irrefutably curious about life in all of its aspects and is excited to take on new and formidable challenges as we strive to bring innovative solutions to our client’s business problems of all kinds.

We also want to take this opportunity to thank Garima Khandelwal, the founding member of Mullen Lintas for her amazing contribution over the years in making the agency one of the top 10. We wish her the very best in the world for her future endeavours.”

Excited about the new role, Ram Jayaraman said, "I believe technology is a new canvas to tell old human truths and stories. And that creativity today is shape-shifting; it looks different depending on the medium it talks through. With the explosion of surfaces and opportunities to collaborate with external talent, there has never been a better time to be a creative professional. After Meta, along with the kind of work I’d want to do, I was very clear about the kind of people I’d want to work with. At Mullen Lintas, I found a kindred bunch who are unfettered by legacy, excited only by the laurels yet to be earned. Hari and I’ve partnered extremely well in the past, and in Subbu, I see much to learn from in the future. Having worked deeply across the traditional and the tech-driven, I’m excited to bring my experience and my best to our teams and bold clients."

82.5 Communications, an Ogilvy Group company, has onboarded Bhavneet Bhalla to lead its strategic planning function. 

Bhavneet is a seasoned planning leader with over 27 years of experience in agencies like WT and Lowe, in India and in Muscat. 

Extremely passionate about leading transformation experiences across categories, he has worked on brands like Hero Honda, Ford Motors, Shell Retail, Britannia - Rural Markets, Future Group, TI Cycles, Wockhardt Hospital, US Polo, Flying Machine and ShareChat. 

He is also a published author and has worked with various government departments including the Ministry of Tourism - for developing the blueprint of Indian Tourism in the Metaverse and in the product design of Indiagram, a PPP model for an NRI outreach. 

Bhavneet will be based in Mumbai and will report into Kapil Arora, CEO & Co-Chairman, 82.5 Communications India (an Ogilvy Group Company). On his appointment, Bhavneet stated, “82.5 Communications, is all about enriching brands with Indianness - that too at a time when India and Indianness are shining like never before. The agency has already built a reputation of delivering formidable solutions for brands. And I am super excited to be partnering Kapil, Anuraag, and Mayur, in building on that foundation and helping our clients win through meaningful communications and experience interventions.”

Kapil added, “Bhavneet is a planner at the intersections. Of people and technology. Of geographies and functions. Of categories and culture. Of business and the environment. His rich experience, spark and ground-up perspective are the fuel that will help us deliver more compelling work on our brands and add to the elbows-in counsel our clients have come to expect from 82.5 Communications.”

Vivek Sinha has moved back as the Editor of VCCircle along with his team at The Capital Quest.

He announced the move via a social media post in which he spoke of the challenges ahead.

Sinha stepped down as Managing Editor of VCCircle in January 2021 after a stint of nearly 10 years.

He was earlier with The Economic Times. Sinha left ET after a 10-year stint as Head ET Intelligence Group(Delhi) & Senior Assistant Editor.