ZenithOptimedia announces Satyajit Sen, Navin Khemka's exit; gets Dnyanada Chaudhari, Prasanna Kulkarni

Chaudhari will join as managing partner, ZenithOptimedia, while Kulkarni is appointed chief creative officer of the group.

ZenithOptimedia has finally confirmed the departure of its old hand Satyajit Sen, who is moving on from the agency after eight years. Recently, he held the position of chief executive officer. Meanwhile, the company's managing partner, Navin Khemka is also exiting the group. After a stint of eight years at ZenithOptimedia, Khemka has put in his papers.

On their exit, group CEO of ZenithOptimedia Anupriya Acharya says, "After putting in eight years with ZenithOptimedia, Satya has decided to embrace a new challenge. We thank him for all his contributions to ZO and wish him all the very best. ZOG thanks Navin also for his contributions and wishes him well in his next assignment."

The company has got on board Madison Pinnacle COO Dnyanada Chaudhari as the managing partner for ZenithOptimedia India. Chaudhari will be in-charge of trading and media management nationally and in this role, she will partner marketing teams to not just look at efficiencies but also leverage strategic alliances across media partners, in line with its Live ROI philosophy.

Commenting on Chaudhari's appointment, Acharya adds, "Dnyanada brings with her the exact expertise needed for this role. Her diverse background across strategy, buying and media management as well as experience with large scale businesses, is especially suited to create and refresh our trading architecture and execution across all media including TV, print, radio, digital, OOH, experiential and other specialist services."

ZenithOptimedia Group has also roped in former JWT digital ECD Prasanna Kulkarni to wear the hat of the chief creative officer of the company. Based in Mumbai, he will be in-charge of creative and content marketing solutions across ZenithOptimedia, Performics, Resultrix and Newcast.

"Increasingly we are finding our clients requiring creative content solutions across not only online but even on integrated campaigns. Prasanna's role is towards driving competitive edge in our product through superior integration of creative and content solutions. In fact as we move ahead, we will look at getting more and more diversified talent on board," Acharya adds.

Chaudhari will be based in the company's Gurgaon office. She says, "I'm excited to be back and strongly believe in ZenithOptimedia's Live ROI principle and am very keen on partnering marketing teams to not just look at efficiencies but to also strategically leverage alliances to drive thought leadership and brand ROI."

Commenting on his new role, Kulkarni says, "Great opportunity to work across the focus groups like performance-based marketing, content- led communication solutions, and integrated campaigns with ZenithOptimedia and its divisions, extremely glad to be part of such a multidisciplinary team at ZOG. I look forward to taking the organisation's creative capabilities to the next level by elevating the bar for innovative content. I am confident we are on our way to making ZenithOptimedia, Performics, Resultrix and Newcast a stimulating place for creatives and patrons alike.

Chaudhari brings to the table 18 years of work experience across diverse functions including strategic planning, buying and media management. She has worked both on the agency as well as the client side. Before joining Madison, she was at Lodestar and ZenithOptimedia.

Her client experience includes ICICI Prudential, Marico and HUL. At HUL, she was head, media services in India and was amongst the top 40 media people in the Unilever world."

Meanwhile, Kulkarni has over 16 years of experience in advertising, brand strategy, and digital media. Earlier, he was at OgilvyOne Worldwide India as senior creative director - Digital; his experience also includes Rediff.com, Ogilvy Interactive and the E-learning domain. He has worked for clients like IBM, Diageo, CEAT, Cadbury, Vodafone, Vespa, Lenovo, HSBC, Tata Motors, Castrol, STAR India, Perfetti Van Melle, HUL, British Airways, Starbucks and Godrej.

For the record, ZenithOptimedia Group's client list in India includes Nestle, OLX, Micromax, LVMH Group, Honda, Uninor, Jabong, Yatra, Toshiba, Viber and Fabfurnish. Through Resultrix, it also handles the digital duties of MaxBupa, ICICI Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, STAR India, Birla Sun Life Insurance, Tata AIG Life Insurance, Musafir, Games 24X7 and others.