DDB Mudra all set to write a blazing saga!

DDB Mudra Group unveiled the new brand, colours and organisation structure in India, keeping in line with its growth plans. The alliances, along with a few other crucial announcements we made at an event held in Mumbai on 28 February 2012. The media present at the event were addressed by an elaborate set of officials from the group, which comprised of John Zeigler Chairman & CEO, DDB Group Asia Pacific, Japan and India, Madhukar Kamath, Group CEO and Managing Director, DDB Mudra Group, Jim Sexton, Global Chief Marketing Officer, Tracy Locke.

John Zeigler said, "If we look at business today in Asia, is not as high it should be. One of the steps taken is to understand Indian market as it's amongst largest market in the world. Due to trends in communication there had been loads of significant change in other regions of this world too."

"In terms of business, we established communication business in 1959, and we are in top 5 and all the players in the industry are the more seen players in the world as we use this opportunities to move around and do the best in the span of time. We got opportunity to grow in Asia and we are looking to it," Zeigler added.

Madhukar Kamath making the first announcement said, "We have done changes in our group structures and DDBMudra will now grow accordingly. We are proud about our past and excited about future."

According to these structural changes, Rajiv Sabnis will be President, DDB Mudra Group; Ranji Cherian, also President ' DDB Mudra Group will play a similar role for South. Anurag Bansal will be Director Finance, DDB Mudra Group and will now function as deputy to Group CFO whereas Dilip Upadhyaya apart from his role as Head, Mudra Ahmedabad, Sudarshan Banerjee will now also be Director, Business Development, DDB Mudra Group, and will report to Group Chief Operating Officer, PratapBose. Arijit Ray, currently President, Mudra West, will now work on a new assignment in the DDB Mudra Group; Mandeep Malhotra (Mandy) driving the Experiential, Retail and OOH Agenda; Aneil Deepak (Andee) will be leading the planning and creative function in DDB MudraMax as National Head ' Ideas; NP Sathyamurthy will be driving the MudraMax media agenda; Venkat Mallik will be running RAPP and Tribal DDB; Soumitra Sen and his fast expanding DDB Health & Lifestyle practice; Ashish Mishra in Water, and Radha in Maatra and with Vandana Das joining us as President ' DDB Mudra Group in Delhi in mid-March.

Sonal Dabral would be coming on board as Chairman & Chief Creative Officer, from March 1 and Pratap is working closely as Group COO. The entire group is a simplified structure, the effective date for the change of identity and the roll- out will be Thursday, March 1, 2012.

Kamath further added, "We would be dealing worldwide and there would be 3 brands in the group i.e. DDB Mudra, Mudra and DDB Mudra Max and 40% of our clients are across the world are using more than one company. Mudra shall continue to be the partnership firm for entrepreneurs with a pan-India presence across Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Kochi, Kolkata and Mumbai."

"RAPP continues to be the data driven marketing services agency. Tribal DDB India shall function as interactive and new media agency.New website go live on 1st march. Maatra will also continue to operate as the localisation and pre-media services agency, and will function as an independent unit," Kamath said.

Under the second announcement that was made, Kamath said, "Under the new structure, Water, the branding and design consultancy, will represent Omnicom's brand consultancy Interbrand in India following the restructuring from 1st march. Interbrand is successful because of local alignment growth through the strength of local partners in the market."

Also DDB Mudra Group has announced the entry of TracyLocke, a global shopper marketing agency, into India. Jim Sexton will be the Global Chief Marketing Officer of TracyLocke. He, in his presentation said, "We have Lock brands in America and Asia pacific as well, proud to be part of new structure, part of new cyclone of love, it took 4 months to work on this. TracyLocke will be a part of the DDB Worldwide Network and will fit into the DDB Mudra Group in partnership with DDB MudraMax."

An interesting facet to the event was the group's zeal to not only 'teach' but 'learn' as well! Mudra will retain its identity and want their people to be digitally oriented. DDB Group Asia Pacific will host its regional summit from 26 to 28 March 2012, in Mumbai. The summit will showcase the immense wealth of experience, skill sets, global practices and unique learning of the entire DDB Asia Pacific region which has distinguished itself in 2011 with several impressive wins such as Spikes Asia's Network Agency of the Year 2010 and 2011, AdFest Network Agency of the Year, the most awarded agency at Campaign's Agency of the Year and the leading agency for most of the year on R3's new business league.

Speaking on these lines, Kamath said, "In Asia pacific we are still growing, and from past 7 years we are focusing on innovations as we represent half of the population of the world. 300 employees, 36 agencies taking clients to work, business is the only unique network in Asia pacific offering cohesive collaboration of world leaders in communication business, uniqueness in world wide. From advertisers point of view rather than we to send it to clients give us your budget and we can do that for them."

The Group will now comprise eight branded agencies which are DDB Mudra ' the Influence & Behavioural Change agency with a pan India presence across Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Kochi, Kolkata and Mumbai; DDB MudraMax'the Experience & Engagement agency which offers Media, Out-Of-Home, Retail and Experiential; Mudra'the Partnership for Entrepreneurs agency with a pan India presence across Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Kochi, Kolkata and Mumbai; DDB Health & Lifestyle' Health & Lifestyle Solutions practice; RAPP ' Data Driven Marketing Services agency; Tribal DDB India' Interactive & New Media agency; Water ' Brand & Design Consultancy and Maatra' Localisation& Pre-media Services agency.