Flashback 2010: Moving to newer pastures in OOH

The year gone by witnessed movements aplenty in the OOH industry; afaqs! looks at the significant ones.

Much like the rest of the industry, the outdoor advertising industry had an eventful year when it came to outdoor professionals moving on to greener pastures or moving up the ladder.

Early last year, Gautam Jhanjee joined MOMS, Madison's outdoor division as deputy general manager, North. He took over the reins from Krishnendu Ghosh, who had moved to Milestone Brandcom, Nabendu Bhattacharyya's OOH venture, as regional head, North.

Having spent almost a year with MOMS, Jhanjee later put in his papers with the company and joined US Adcom in mid-December to head the new business development functions.

In January, Gourav Tandon, national director at OOH specialist network, Navia Asia (an arm of ZenithOptimedia) was promoted to the post of chief operating officer (India). Tandon was in charge of business development since April 2009. He eventually moved out of Navia Asia later.

In February, Vikas Bhambri, vice-president, sales and marketing, TDI International put in his papers. In March, he went on to join Mudra Max as senior vice-president focusing on strengthening the agency's outdoor business. Raj Mohanty, senior business director, Poster Publicity called it quits moving to LG Ad, a Korean creative agency as general manager.

In November 2009, telecom brand Uninor appointed Navia Asia as its outdoor agency. The latter brought in Aman Chaudhary as national client services director in February, just to handle the Uninor account. Chaudhary was deputy general manager, Percept OOH, before this move.

North and south

MPG Active, part of MPG India, appointed Rajeev Luthra as business director. This is Luthra's first stint in the OOH domain.

In April, Reliance Media World announced the appointment of Navneeth Mohan to head its BTL offerings covering events and activations. Mohan has spent almost a decade in the events business at Encompass, a WPP group company.

Laqshya's erstwhile president, projects, Indrajit Sen, took over as CEO in April. Sen was also made responsible for both the media ownership business and the agency business, OMI, at Laqshya Media. This development followed the exit of Satish Singh, president, OMI. In a parallel development, Soumitra Bhattacharyya, who had quit Laqshya in February 2009 after spending two years as CEO came back and took over as president, corporate affairs.

In May, RK Swamy Hansa appointed Tyronne Devros as VP, Hansa Outdoor. He reports to Surojoy Banerjee, CEO, Hansa Outdoor. Devros was VP, Integrid Media, Mumbai.

Aaren Initiative, the outdoor arm of Lintas Media Group (LMG), appointed Charan Jeet Singh as associate business director. Reporting to Vivek Lakhwara, CEO, Aaren Initiative, Singh will take care of the agency's existing clients in the North zone.

Media sales company Publicitas roped in Robin Carruthers to head Mediascope Publicitas. June also saw Milestone Brandcom bring on board Ganesh Prabhudev as regional head, South India and member, executive committee.

Prabhudev, an OOH professional with about 15 years of experience, moved in from the DPI Group and Media 24x7, two sister concerns with interests in OOH digital printing, media and sports marketing, where he spent five years.

The agency also roped in J Prakash as business head, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Prakash was the group account manager, Ogilvy Landscapes before this move.

poster boys

Navia Asia was in the news again when it announced the appointment of Cyrus Dumasia as head, Western region. He joined Navia from TDI International.

Starcom MediaVest Group India promoted Kaushik Chakravorty as group chief operating officer - OOH. This was a newly-created position within the group. Sanjay Dayal, general manager, ITM moved on to TDI Media Services as associate vice-president. By the end of December, Chakravorty was given overall charge of the outdoor business at SMG.

Mediascope Publicitas strengthened its OOH media team in India with three more appointments. Anirudh Kanade came on board as vice-president, projects. Sanjay Malkani, and Gulrez Haider also joined as assistant vice-president, West, and AVP North respectively.

Hemanth Shah, executive vice-president and revenue head, Times OOH, moved to Lintas Media Group (LMG) as president, OOH Initiatives.

Primesite, Mudra MAX's OOH solutions unit roped in Monisha Mitra as general manager. Prior to this appointment, she was with Kinetic, GroupM as its head, strategy and planning. Mandeep Malhotra, who was till recently senior vice-president of Primesite, at OOH solutions unit of Mudra MAX, was promoted to the post of president, OOH services at the agency.

Madhuri Sapru, managing partner, Kinetic & Dialect South Asia, who handled the position since mid 2006, put in her papers in September. She had joined Kinetic after Pratap Bose joined O&M India as CEO.

Following the resignation of Sapru, Kinetic appointed Rajul Kulshreshtha as its managing director in November. Kulshreshtha has been with GroupM for the past six years, initially heading the LG business and then going on to head Motivator, a GroupM media agency.

The end of the year saw Katha Mediatix, the OOH arm of Mumbai-based Katha Group, make two significant appointments to strengthen its new business verticals. It brought on board Pabitra Roy as chief creative officer and Aniruddha Pal as executive vice-president, strategic alliance. Roy was senior vice-president, creative, BEI Confluence, a creative agency, while Pal was business head, Planman Marcom.