LinEngage appoints Sriharsh Grandhe as executive vice president

Based in Mumbai, he will be reporting to Vikas Mehta, CMO and president, group marketing services, Mullen Lowe Lintas Group.

LinEngage, the experiential marketing and activation arm of Mullen Lowe Lintas Group, has announced the appointment of Sriharsh Grandhe as executive vice president. Based in Mumbai, he will be reporting to Vikas Mehta, CMO and president, group marketing services, Mullen Lowe Lintas Group.

Prior to joining LinEngage, Grandhe was with the WPP firm Possible Worldwide Singapore, as the engagement director. At Possible, he was managing the global roll-out of Standard Chartered's responsive website, a first in the banking domain across 55 countries in APAC, EMEA and Americas. Prior to Possible, Grandhe was AVP and practice head at Wipro, responsible for rolling out marketing as a process for several global businesses from Europe, US and Australia.

Grandhe began his career with Tata Infomedia about two decades ago, and has navigated a journey spanning advertising, consumer engagement, publishing and retail. He is an experienced professional across the marketing continuum with a focus on digital and activation. Throughout his professional journey, he has driven various marketing programmes for Standard Chartered, P&G, J&J, a global major in big data and cloud computing, Large Australian Telco, a financial services major in US and more such global businesses, across US, APAC and Europe.

Mehta says, "Our ambition for LinEngage is to make consumer engagement an essential part of a brand's narrative. A lot more innovation is possible in the area of creating meaningful consumer experiences. Under Harsh's leadership, we are keen to make strides in strengthening this practice in an industry that's largely driven by tactical activations."

LinEngage offers specialist brand engagement expertise to a host of clients in India. Apart from its focus on the urban pockets, LinEngage boasts of a bespoke rural offering - LinTerland. The motive is to help clients capitalise on consumer engagement opportunities in India's heartland. Some of its clients include Johnson & Johnson, Franke Faber, Bayer, UltraTech, Castrol, ICICI Prudential and Byju's. Grandhe's remit will be to evangelise the experiential marketing practice for the group and further expand the portfolio.

Commenting on his role at LinEngage, Grandhe says, "The strong lineage of Mullen Lowe Lintas Group is no secret. India is at an exciting phase of development and the agency is experiencing both momentum and growth. LinEngage is in a sweet spot right now with only one direction to go - upwards."

Grandhe has received awards at DMA for world-class marketing and activation programmes for brands like Visa and Madura Garments. He has also worked in agencies such as iContract, Rediffusion Y&R and JWT.

Mullen Lowe Lintas Group is part of the Interpublic Group of Companies (NYSE: IPG). The Group has operating divisions in advertising (Lowe Lintas, Mullen Lintas), activation (LinEngage), design (dCell), digital (LinTeractive), brand consulting (LinConsult), motion picture (LinProductions), healthcare marketing (LinHealth) and PR (GolinOpinion) that claim to manage 300 plus clients.