THE FINANCIAL EXPRESS TUESDAY | OCTOBER 26, 2010

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starting in India before stepping into a store season salutes Warli art
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A H M E D A B A D B A N G A L O R E C H A N D I G A R H C H E N N A I H Y D E R A B A D K O C H I K O L K A T A L U C K N O W M U M B A I N E W D E L H I P U N E

(From left)
Ajit Menon, president,
organization
development, Mudra
Group, Dilip Kumar
Upadhyaya, CFO,
Mudra Group, Pratap
Bose, COO, Mudra Group
& CEO, Mudra Max,
Madhukar Kamath, MD
& group CEO, Mudra
Group, Bobby Pawar,
chief creative officer,
Mudra Group, Sandip Vij,
CEO, DDB Mudra and
Jude Fernandes, CEO,
Mudra India.

MUDRA’S
NEW MOVES
The Mudra Group under Madhukar Kamath has undergone a major transformation. With a new brand identity,
the group today is in the running to become one of India's top communications hotshops, boasting of global clients, and ready
to venture into areas such as shopper marketing, sports marketing and public affair communications.
Pritha Mitra Dasgupta primary reason behind this was that So while we all realised the importance of So when the agency's founder AG
many of its creative geniuses— the DDB partnership, nothing much was Krishnamurty retired in 2003, Kamath
HEN Madhukar R Balakrishnan, Prathap Suthan, done about it.” was brought in to steer the company out of
Kamath, the D Ramakrishna, Santosh Desai, Rensil At the same time, the Indian the doldrums.
group CEO and D’Silva, Ryan Menezes, Sonal Dabral, advertising industry was buoyant with Kamath realised that the group
managing director Anup Chitnis and others – exited around opportunities as new Indian and foreign had to move fast to fill the gaps. His
of Mudra Group, this time. This was followed by two brands emerged. Since Mudra was known agenda was to be present in every
unveiled the group's big-ticket accounts—Reliance for its expertise in traditional advertising consumer touchpoint including media
new brand identity Communica-tions and Samsung— and not so much for other marketing buying and planning,
this September, it moving out. services, the agency faced competition healthcare, rural
marked the final leg of a one-account ad Also, despite its association with from rivals including Ogilvy & Mather, marketing,
agency's arduous journey (and effort) to international communication network Lowe Lintas, McCann Ercikson, JWT and out-of-home,
become one of India's top most DDB, the agency could not capitalise on others. The global holding companies of research, public
independent communication networks. this. An industry veteran, who has closely these agencies, who had already relations, online advertising
For Kamath himself, it was the watched Mudra's rise, but did not want to consolidated their traditional advertising and others.
culmination of a dream that began in 2003 be named, says, “The focus was always to business, were aggressive on building
when he came back to lead Mudra. grow the traditional advertising business. their non-traditional advertising services. ■ Continued on Page 2
“Challenges were there in terms of
building the leadership, setting up the
teams, changing the mindset,” says
Kamath.
◗ FACE OFF MADHUKAR KAMATH, Group CEO & MD, Mudra Group

“We have just unleashed the growth

Mudra had all along thrived on
traditional advertising. Thirty years ago
when Mudra started its journey, because
of its shareholding pattern—90% held by
Anil Ambani and 10% by DDB—Mudra
was perceived as a Reliance agency
though it was quick to pick up some
prestigious accounts including Godrej,
Rasna and Dabur. But over the years, it
has successfully shed that image. So
besides working on the Reliance accounts
(it created the ‘Only Vimal’ tagline for the
company’s apparel brand), Mudra was
also behind some iconic taglines such as ‘I
love you Rasna’, ‘The Mint with the hole’,
‘Humko Binny's Mangta’ and ‘My daddy
strongest’. The dominance of the agency
continued as it helped global fast food
chain McDonalds launch its business in
India in 1996.
But the winds of change had started
blowing. In the year 2003 when the agency
started beefing up its service offerings,
the creative side of the agency started
faltering. Industry watchers say that the
potential of the four agencies”
When AG Krishnamurthy, the founder of
advertising and marketing communications
network Mudra Group retired in 2003,
Madhukar Kamath, the current group CEO
and managing director, Mudra Group, was
brought on board. His task was not only to
strengthen the existing advertising business
but also to grow it. And it took Kamath just
eight years to do that. After restructuring the
group into four agencies, on Mudra's 30th
anniversary, Kamath unveiled a new look for
the agency.
In an exclusive interview with FE's Pritha
Mitra Dasgupta, Madhukar Kamath talks
about the journey so far.Edited excerpts.
This is your second stint with Mudra. You
left Mudra in 1999 to start Bates and then
joined back in 2003. Do you think the Bates
experience helped you rebuild Mudra?
Stepping out of Mudra gave me an opportu-
nity to look into the agency from outside. That,
coupled with my experience at Mudra,made me
feel that the agency has a lot of potential.When I
joined back it was not about rebuilding Mudra,
but taking the agency forward. It was about set-
ting a new agenda for the agency.
Bates was just three years old when you ex-
ited and under your leadership it was doing
very well. It had won many prestigious ac-
counts and had launched other marketing
services as well. So what made you quit
Bates and join Mudra?
Quitting Bates was a really tough decision.
Here was a situation where I had brought in
Bates, acquired Clarion, launched Zenith-
Optimedia and 141. But when this offer came
up to succeed Krishnamurthy it seemed
challenging. Both my personal and profes-
sional growth is to some extent intertwined
with that of Mudra. It was the tremendous
challenge of growing Mudra that motivated
me to join back.
■ Continued on Page 2
2
THE FINANCIAL EXPRESS

THE FINANCIAL EXPRESS

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2010

MUDRA’S NEW “We have just unleashed

the growth potential of
MOVES the four agencies”
■ Continued from page 1 ■ Continued from page 1

“My first task
was to set a new
agenda for the
future because we already had a
tremendous set of clients,” said Kamath.
A former employee of Mudra who did
not want to be named says, “Mudra
always had big clients and since 2003 it
had the vigour to become a topnotch
communication network. It did not
succeed because of lack of coordination
amongst the various businesses.”
Mudra first floated a healthcare unit
called Brand Therapist as it already had
pharma clients such as Cadila Healthca-
re, Core Pharmaceuticals, Paras Phar-
maceuticals, Sun Pharma and Torrent. In
2004, Mudra, in association with Rapp
Collins Worldwide, formed a direct mark-
eting agency Rapp Collins India. DBS,
which was Mudra's digital solutions arm
became a part of Tribal DDB Worldwide.
The real growth of the agency started
in 2005. That year it acquired Delhi-based
Kidstuff Promos and Events. It also
floated a new agency called Canvas Com-
munications to handle the creative duties
of Johnson & Johnson's skincare brands.
In 2007, Mudra launched a new agency
called DDB Mudra that was mandated to
handle global DDB accounts coming into
the country, including Unilever's Lipton
range and also the conflicting businesses
of the mother agency. Canvas was then
merged with DDB Mudra.
However, amidst all this, the creative
quotient of Mudra was being challenged.
And in 2007, Bobby Pawar moved back
from Chicago and was named the
national creative director of Mudra. He
says, “When I joined Mudra there were
two tasks at hand. When someone talked
about the top creative work done out of
India, no one mentioned Mudra. So, task
number one was to change that.” The
second task was to change the vision
about creative solutions and create more
media neutral or broad ideas.
And it was finally in 2009, Kamath did
a reconnaissance and restructured the
group into four agencies—Mudra India,
Mudra Max, DDB Mudra and Ignite
India. Today, Mudra Group is one of the
largest home-grown communication
networks with over 26 offices in India and
is valued at more than Rs 2000 crore.
“The revamp or the relaunch was
required. This is simply to say we
understand consumers better. But the
real story is about the new structure of
Mudra, the four agencies, the
integration, and I believe this is our
strength. Also each business is anchored
by a board member. Therefore, besides
growing my business, I also need to
safeguard the shareholder interest,” said
Jude Fernandes, CEO of Mudra India,
the creative agency that accounts for
nearly 40% of the group's revenues.
However, the largest grosser is the
group’s media business – Mudra Max—
B I T S & BY T E S
which contributes 42-45% of the annual
turnover. It was in 2008 that Mudra Max,
with two independent agencies under it,
Mudra Connext and Mudra Radar, was
created. “The first year was all about
building the teams and launching new
units,” says Pratap Bose, CEO, Mudra
Max and COO, Mudra Group.
Bose also heads Ignite India, which
caters to the brand building needs of
entrepreneurs. “The agency was kicked
off about a year ago. When we looked at
our clients' entrepreneurial ventures, we
saw a huge need for us to look at clients in
smaller centres, clients who were
untouched by bigger agencies in non
metros.” However, when it ventured into
small towns and cities, the agency
realized that the clients were more
worried about issues such as raising
capital, packaging, distribution, pricing,
and advertising was the last thing on
their minds. “We realized that if we help
them in these issues then advertising
would automatically fall on our laps.”
The fourth, and the one of the most
important businesses of the group, is
DDB India, which is headed by Sandip
Vij. It has four specialist units under it
including DDB India, Tribal DDB, Rapp,
DDB Health & Lifestyle. “ We are making
significant investments in all DDB
Mudra units,” says Vij.
Akshay Mehrotra, head – marketing
and corporate communications, Bajaj
FIVE FORMER EXECUTIVES VIEWS ON MUDRA
“While earlier it “Earlier you had to
wasn't known go all out to make
as a creative something happen
powerhouse, it has in Mudra. Now,
now established it’s a consolidated
itself as a creative effort. There is a
agency. They are machinery in
giving competition place to make
to O&M for the things happen
top slot.” creatively.”
Rahul Ghosh Anup Chitnis
Group creative director, ECD,
TBWA Ogilvy & Mather
(Clockwise from top)
Ad campaigns created by
Mudra Group for Dabur Vatika,
McDonalds,Samsung, Reliance
Communications, Rasna ,
Big Bazaar and Godrej
turing
followed by the
repositioning and new
logo is an effort to put
forward a united front. To some
extent I feel the repositioning is really
shallow. Why was it required is not clear.
The agency is known for some iconic
Photo montage: advertising which got lost somewhere.
SURENDER SINGH
Will this new initiative help Mudra
Allianz create new brand stories? We will have to
Insurance says, “In wait and watch.” says the former Mudra
DDB India, we see employee, who did not want to be
people and partners who identified.
have a deep understanding To be sure, the group is not sitting easy.
and capability to provide integrat- “Going forward, the growth will come in
ed communication solutions that connect three ways, through partnerships,
with customers across the country.” collaborations and acquisitions,” says
Although handling Indian clients has Kamath, readying for new challenges.
been one of Mudra’s biggest strengths, For Mudra India, there are two
this year it has proved that it is equally challenges, says CEO Fernandes. “One, to
competent to launch international iconic do better work, although the quality of
brands in India. In 2010, the agency print and television work has improved
helped German auto major Volkswagen over the years.” Second is to generate
launch its cars in India. Lutz Kothe, chief ideas which are media neutral. “It is also
general manager marketing and PR, important to renew our relationship with
Volkswagen India says, “The strength existing clients including Godrej, Dabur,
lies in DDB Mudra's creative perform- Paras, Future Group and help them
ance and the capability to understand the improve their market share,” he adds.
brand while transforming it to the cus- Despite its spectacular growth, Mudra
tomer’s needs. As India is certainly a Max lost its biggest account this year,
market of its own Volkswagen mixed the when the Rs 400-crore media business of
DNA of the brand with the needs of the Reliance Communications went to rivals
market and its customers in a distinctive Optimum Media Direction (OMD) and
strategy. DDB Mudra transformed it into MEC. But the agency sees a silver lining
a creative strategy which matched the in this. Pratap Bose, CEO, Mudra Max,
market needs.” says, “We reduced our dependency on one
Clients have certainly appreciated the big client and aggressively went out to
new strategy at Mudra. Says Pranay sign more. Also, I keep saying we have
Dhabhai, managing director, Akai India, nothing to lose and everything to win.”
“Partnering with Mudra is a vital and Mudra is now looking to enter new
integral part of our overall business businesses like shopper marketing,
strategy and correctly fits with our goal sports marketing, public affair
to reinstate our position in India. Their communications. Last year it signed a
strategic thinking with an overall media joint venture with Clear Channel in the
perspective, an extremely passionate and out-of-home segment and with UK-based
enthusiastic team, made us choose them retail design specialist Portland. The
as our media partners.” endeavour is clearly to make the Mudra
However, not everyone is sure whether Group a cutting-edge, sophisticated
the latest restructuring will work. “To my four-agency network that can take on
estimation this entire process of restruc- global rivals.
“I saw Mudra grow “When I was “It used to be a very
from a place where there,there was Indian agency with
creativity was this underdog Indian entrepre-
discouraged into a image and it neurial clients and
place where creati- wanted to prove had just started
vity was respected, something. Now, it polishing the
and I’m proud that is a more esta- processes. Today,
I was instrumental blished agency. the internal
in initiating that The environment processesseem to
change.” has changed.” have gotten better.”
Ryan Menezes Santosh Desai Chandradeep Mitra
ECD, CEO and MD, Future Founder and CEO,
McCann Erickson Brands PipalMajik
You turned Mudra from a mainline ad agency to a gi-
ant integrated communication network. How has
the journey been?
How can I culminate 30 years in just two lines? All I can
say,the first year when I joined back,that is,2003,was spent
in streamlining the organization and setting the goals for
the agency.And the journey has been exciting.Challenges
were there in terms of building the leadership, setting up
the teams, changing the mindset. Mudra always had a
tremendous set of clients and we simply built on them.
Industry watchers say that Mudra never suffered
from any dearth of clients. But till about 4-5 years
ago, it was the gaps in the creative side that was hold-
ing it back. Do you agree?
In the 1980s Mudra was the trendsetter and it had creat-
ed many iconic communications like Vimal, Dhara and
others. Even in the 1990s, quality work was happening.
Twice in the 90s, Mudra became the agency of the year. It
was in 2000 when we started growing,that there were new
demands on the creative front. So we brought Bobby
Pawar on board.
Mudra has also fostered many top creatives of the in-
dustry today – starting from R Balakrishnan (Balki),
Pratap Suthan, Anup Chitnis, Ramki (D Ramakrish-
na), Sajan Raj Kurup, Sonal Dabral, Amer Jaleel,
Ryan Menezes – would you agree that retaining tal-
ent has been a challenge for Mudra?
Every creative person
goes through this churn
and they try their luck
somewhere else. Yes, it
has been a good challenge
for us.
The Rs 400-crore Re-
liance Communica-
tions media planning
business has recently
moved out. How has it
affected Mudra Group,
especially Mudra Max?
Do you want to win it
back?
It’s the loss of the busi-
ness that has strength-
ened the goal to build a
strong business for Mu-
dra Max. Also, we are still
working with them (Anil
Ambani’s other business-
es under ADAG). Only the Reliance Communications
part went out. I think every business has its ups and
downs. As the client has said, they wanted to review the
operations. Of course, we would like to win it back. And I
believe every business you lose is there to win back.
Within the Mudra Group, which business is the
fastest growing?
We have just unleashed the growth potential of all the
four agencies, that is, Mudra India, Mudra Max, DDB and
Ignite. Every single agency is growing at a rate of 15-20%.
So far, Mudra Max has been the largest as it has 14-15
clients and my estimation is that soon it will become 20.
And this is more in line with its global partner Omnicom.
Despite your association with DDB, do you think you
could not leverage it?
That was one of the tasks when I joined back Mudra in
2003. And over the last five years, the DDB business has
grown tremendously. We have most of the DDB global
units in India.Bobby Pawar is now on the creative council
of DDB in the Asia Pacific region.I would say in the Mudra
growth story, both DDB and Omnicom have been our ma-
jor allies.
What was the idea behind the Mudra makeover?
The overall growth of Mudra has been a journey and
there are certain steps that needed to be taken.There was a
need to create a distinct identity for Mudra. We refreshed
the brand when Mudra completed 25 years. But that was a
small initiative. And now we have an identity that reflects
the organization and sets the agenda for future.
What will be the strategy going forward?
Mudra has built itself into these four agencies. Each
one has clarity in terms of direction.There are several ar-
eas where we would like to offer or strengthen our capabil-
ities, such as sports marketing, public affairs, shopper
marketing and others. Going forward, the growth will
come in three ways, through partnerships, collabora-
tions and acquisitions.

Anil Uniyal is CEO,
CNBC-TV18 and CNBC Awaaz
Anil Uniyal, chief operating officer,
Network18 Media, and business head,
TV18, media operations, has been
appointed CEO of Network18's
business news channels, CNBC-TV18
and CNBC Awaaz. In his new role,
Uniyal will be responsible for the
strategic, financial and operational
management of Ithe two channels and
will report to B Saikumar, group COO,
Network 18. B Saikumar, group COO,
Network18, said, “Anil has been one of
the key executives involved in the
growth of Network18's business news
channels since their respective
launches. He is now expected to steer
the channels into a whole new phase of
leadership and profitability.”
Madison wins ITC account;
Mindshare gets Videocon d2h
Madison World has won the media
duties for ITC. The agency will now
handle the entire ITC portfolio, across
all verticals. The size of the business is
over Rs 400 crore. The incumbent on
the account is Lintas Media Group
(LMG). The media agencies that took
part in the pitch process include Group
M's MEC, Starcom MediaVest and
Mudra Max.
Meanwhile, media buying agency
Mindshare has won the Videocon d2h
business along with Philips and
Electrolux. “We are extremely happy to
set up Team Videocon and provide
communication
management
solutions that will
drive their
businesses,” said
Gowthaman
Ragothaman, leader,
Mindshare India.
OgilvyOne wins gold
at DMA Echo
OgilvyOne Mumbai
has won a gold at
the DMA Echo
awards held in San
Francisco. The
award is for the
‘Yacht Blueprint’
mailer done for DHL Express India.
OgilvyOne also picked up a Leader
Award for its entry ‘Number Game’ for
IBM. “What’s indeed a matter of pride
for us is that we are consistently
bettering ourselves,” said Vaishakhi
Bharucha, senior creative director.
The DMA Echo is considered to be
one of the highest honours in direct
marketing with a very rigorous three-
step judging process spanning a few
months. The award celebrates the
pinnacle of marketing excellence
combining visionary strategy,
compelling creative and breakthrough
results.
AR Rahman is brand
ambassador for Toyota Etios
Toyota Kirloskar Motor has roped in
AR Rahman as brand ambassador for
the Toyota Etios, which will be
launched in December this year.
Rahman will endorse the car through
various marketing campaigns of the
company.
On roping in the music maestro as
the face of the Etios campaign, Hiroshi
Nakagawa, managing director, TKM,
said, “There is a very strong connect
between the product and its brand
ambassador, with both being, ‘global’,
‘innovative’, ‘reliable’, and a ‘class-
above quality’.”
Kunal Mukherjee is marke-
ting head, UTV Bindass
UTV Bindass has appointed Kunal
Mukherjee as its marketing head. This
announcement reinforces the
company’s decision to strengthen its
strategic team and highlight its
positioning as the first 360-degree
entertainment brand for Indian youth.
Confirming the development, Nikhil
Gandhi, business head, UTV Bindass,
said, “We are delighted to announce
that Kunal Mukherjee will take on the
role of marketing head for brand
Bindass, in addition to his current
portfolio of marketing head - UTV
World Movies, UTV Movies
and UTV Action.”
Sonam Kapoor is Electrolux
brand ambassador
Home appliances maker Electrolux
has appointed Bollywood actress
Sonam Kapoor as its brand
ambassador in India.
Said Anil Khera, chief executive
officer, PE Electronics Ltd, “This is
the first time that we have engaged
with a brand ambassador as we believe
that Sonam Kapoor encapsulates all
the qualities that Electrolux stands for
and will enable our customers to have
a better connect with our products.”
PE Electronics Ltd is a new
business unit that brings together two
premium brands Philips ( range of
television products ) and Electrolux
(range of Home
Appliances) that
complement each
other as a single
entity under a unique
brand licensee
agreement.