Hewlett Packard has appointed Michael M Bala as Country Manager for its online photo service HP Snapfish in India. Prior to joining HP Snapfish, Bala was Business head at ClickJobs.com, a BharatMatrimony group company. In his new role, Bala will spearhead the operations for HP Snapfish in India, guiding the team to replicate the global success story of the online photo service in the country.
Santosh Kumar has joined HT.com as Head of Ad Sales-South. He will be looking after Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad markets. Kumar will be reporting to HT.com National Sales Head Pooja Puri. His last stint was with Monster.com as Key Account Manager for two years. He was earlier with Tata Infomedia for five years.
Mike McCarthy, Managing Editor for CNN International, has been promoted to the new position of VP-Coverage and Feature Programmes. He will oversee major breaking news and the growing strand of feature programmes produced in CNN's London, Hong Kong and Atlanta production centres. McCarthy has served as CNN International's Atlanta-based Managing Editor since November 2002.
Award-winning journalist and news programming executive Katherine Green has been appointed Senior VP-Programming by CNN International. Green, most recently VP/News Director of WTTG/ Fox 5 News in Washington, D.C., will be based at the network's world headquarters in Atlanta. She will now oversee all of the editorial production, programme development, network talent and day-to-day operations of CNN International.
Aravind Sampathkumaran has joined local search engine AskLaila.com as Chief Product Officer. Prior to joining AskLaila, Sampathkumaran was Group Product Manager, Windows Live, at Microsoft Corp. He will be responsible for product vision and strategy, product design and development, product marketing and management, business development and distribution. Sampathkumaran brings with him over 14 years of experience in technology marketing and evangelism, including 10 years at Microsoft.
K Madhavan Pillai has been appointed Executive Editor of ‘Better Photography’, published by Infomedia India Ltd. Pillai has been associated with the magazine from its inception. Before joining Infomedia, he was branch head in a public relations company. He has also been a publishing consultant. Apart from commercial assignments in photography, Pillai has produced several independent video documentaries and corporate films.
Joseph D’Souza, who was Creative Director-Art at JWT, has moved to Bates David Enterprise. D’Souza started his career over 14 years ago at Leo Burnett as a visualiser on the P&G businesses (Ariel, Vicks, Heinz and Complan). He then moved to Grey Worldwide (then Trikaya Grey), where he handled Ambuja Cement and Kinetic bikes and scooters. Four years later, he joined JWT where he looked after Smirnoff, Club HP (Turbojet and Power), Philips India and Baskin Robbins.
Rohit Malkani, who was Creative Director, Publicis Ambience Mumbai, has joined Bates David Enterprise as Creative Director-Copy. In his five-year stint at Publicis Ambience, he headed the creative team on the Marico brands, apart from working on P&G’s Vicks, and Bisleri mineral water. Before that, Malkani was with Planetasia.com for two years, where he developed the brand strategy and online identity for several companies/brands. Prior to this, Malkani worked with JWT Bangalore, where he spent close to six years handling Taj Mahal Tea, Red Label Tea, Lipton Yellow Label, Kingfisher, Acer, McDowell, Kerala Tourism, Standard Chartered credit cards and Van Heusen.
Kaushik Mitra has moved from Leo Burnett to join Bates David Enterprise as Creative Director. Mitra started his career with Clarion (which became Bates) in Kolkata in 1994 as Copywriter. He spent six years there and worked on ITC (Gold Flake, 555), Berger Paints and Taj Bengal. In 2000, he moved to Mumbai as Group Head for Leo Burnett where he handled Bajaj two-wheeler brands Caliber, Boxer and Eliminator; Hitachi air-conditioners; Fiat cars; IndianOil; McDonald’s and Reliance Mobile. Mitra was responsible for the McDonald’s ‘Humare Zamana ke Daam’ campaign.
PepsiCo India has appointed Vivek Bharati, an economist and external affairs expert, as Executive Director – External Affairs, PepsiCo India. He will succeed Abhiram Seth, who is retiring after having led the External Affairs & Exports function since 2002. Prior to joining PepsiCo, Bharati has been associated with FICCI as Advisor-National Policy & Programmes. He also worked with the World Bank as Advisor to the Country Director. Prior to his stint at the World Bank, Bharati has held various senior editorial roles in The Economic Times, The Times of India and Hindustan Times. His last assignment in the publishing industry was as Editor, The Economic Times-Delhi.
Ramesh Narayan, Founder of Canco Advertising, is known for his immense knowledge of the industry stemming from his 23 years’ experience in advertising.
John Abraham is known to be passionate about bikes and Fastrack uses this association of its brand ambassador to launch its ‘Bikers’ range of sunglasses. Using the punchline ‘Bikers Don’t Cry’, the TVC communicates the message that wearing Fastrack Eyegear keeps discomfort such as tears caused by dust and wind at bay.
TinselVision, an online video-on-demand (VoD) service delivering Indian television and Bollywood film content, has announced the premier of its new show ‘Inside Tinsel’, hosted by Mini Mathur, a former MTV VJ and host of ‘Indian Idol’. TinselVision has also signed deals with B4U and Shemaroo for digital content and movie deal.
Youth entertainment channel Sab has introduced four new shows refreshing its 8.30 pm time band. The four new shows announced are ‘Detective Doll’, ‘Sirf Stories’, ‘Full Masti 88.2’ ‘and ‘Gupchup Coffee Shop’. The shows will premiere on December 3, and will be respectively aired from Monday through Thursday.
MCCS’ Anoop Varma has been appointed India Regional Manager for Viaccess, a European company that delivers solutions for digital pay TV and secured content distribution. The company aims to develop, produce and market conditional access and digital rights management-based systems for all types of contents and services, and for every kind of broadcast.
Global consultancy firm APCO is launching its operations in India, after successful stints in the US, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and other countries in Asia. It will be headed by Devashish Dasgupta as Managing Director of APCO Worldwide India Pvt. Ltd.
At the Big Picture Conference 2007, the journey of the entertainment business in India to the era of digitalisation, where interactivity in cinema has gained significant importance, was discussed at length. The two-day conference in Goa, which commenced on November 22, has been organised by the Confederation of India Industries (CII).
The digital medium in India is much more heated than what anyone would’ve imagined a few months back. For Starcom IP, Starcom MediaVest Group’s digital arm, life per se has digitised today. Every strata of the economy has some aspects of digitisation in it, and as the SEC grow higher, the digitisation level increases. For Starcom IP, where consumer already is 2.0, the marketer is still 1.9.
The Big Picture Conference 2007 with the theme ‘Bridging Business and Creativity’ had representatives from the Government and industry debate on several issues like finance and international co-production treaties for India. The two-day conference in Goa, which began on November 22, has been organised by the CII.
PVR Ltd has launched a new brand ‘PVR Premiere’, targeted at high-end consumers in metros. By 2010, the company aims to set up 30-40 PVR Premiere screens.
TDSAT has allowed TRAI’s order of October 4, 2007 to be continued. The order was in reaction to petitions filed by broadcasters against guidelines by TRAI on pricing of cable TV channels in areas that do not have CAS.
In his new role, Sumant Kasliwal will be responsible for leveraging the strengths of MSN India and the Windows Live Services to create new opportunities and relationships with businesses in the Indian market. Kasliwal will be reporting to Jaspreet Bindra, India Country Manager, Online Service Business of Microsoft India.
Hitachi Home Electronics Asia Pte Ltd on Thursday showcased its Ultra Thin LCD TV series. With this, the company has reiterated its focus on the Indian high-end LCD television market. The Ultra Thin series would be available in India by the first quarter of 2008.
Vishakha Singh, Head-MarCom, Future Media India, finds a new trend consumer behaviour prevailing in the markets of Mumbai: ‘Dhan’ now means Living for Today! It is not about spending on something which has long-term value, it is not only steel utensils or silver or gold or whatever…it is about NOW.
"I don't make anything to suit my sensibility. I always created entertainment that people will like. For NDTV Imagine, we see the environment around, the programming around and the competition around, and get a sense of what we are going to do. It's not about knocking out anyone else's shows, but of being able to carve something for ourselves."