Mindshare ropes in strategy head for North

John Thangaraj, who was with Lowe, will be head of strategy and will handle all Delhi clients of the agency.

Media agency Mindshare has brought on board John Thangaraj as head of strategy for North India. Thangaraj was with Lowe as vice-president, strategic planning. At Mindshare, he will lead the strategic planning of products of all Delhi clients.

Alok Sinha, leader, strategy (South Asia), Mindshare, says, "He's (Thangaraj) got category and industry experience, and is a great team leader. I am confident he will be able to lead the strategy division to even greater heights."

Echoing similar thoughts, Ravi Rao, leader, South Asia, Mindshare, says that Thangaraj has the combination of being imaginative, strategic and entrepreneurial, which is what the agency's strategy community and clients require.

Meanwhile, sharing the reason for joining Mindshare, Thangaraj says, "Mindshare represents a new journey for me - new skills to acquire, new people to meet and new challenges to deal with, which is what excites me the most." He further adds that consumption of information and entertainment is rapidly moving screens and he feels Mindshare is on the cutting edge of optimising and leveraging this. In fact, Thangaraj believes that advertising as is currently practiced in India does not have a shelf life of more than a decade (at the very most).

"'Digital' has become a buzz word we all love to throw around, and I am looking to Mindshare to help me make the journey from 'thinking about digital' to 'thinking digitally'," Thangaraj states.

Having an experience of over 12 years, Thangaraj has worked with Adidas, Quantum and Rediffusion Y&R. In his earlier stint at Lowe, Thangaraj has worked with brands like Wills Lifestyle, Nestle Confectionary, Hindustan Times, Dabur Real, Shine.com, Woodland, Expedia.co.in and OLX.in. Besides this, he has also worked on brands like Danone, Amway, PepsiCo, LG, Bacardi and Yatra.com while working with other agencies.

He has won Effie awards for his work on the Hindustan Times campaigns in 2010, 2012 and 2013. In 2009, he headed the global strategic project for LG Korea on understanding the super affluent consumers of India.

Besides being an F1 fan, Thangaraj is interested in adventure sports, fitness, dogs, rock and metal music, sci-fi, fantasy, horror and comic books.