Bharti AXA General Insurance has signed on Grey India as their advertising agency. The agency has won the mandate earlier handled by Contract Advertising. The account will be handled by the Grey Bangalore office which will provide strategic and creative direction to Bharti AXA General Insurance. The account is estimated to be worth around Rs 12 to 15 crores.
Zen Mobile has roped in Amitabh Bachchan as its brand ambassador to endorse and promote the products offered by Zen Mobiles. Zen Mobiles is geared to launch a slew of Qwerty and multimedia feature rich mobile handsets loaded with social networking experience at affordable price for the Indian market. The company plans to leverage its association with Bachchan through a media campaign and various interactive consumer related activities in the coming months.
Following its successful launch, Hippo, the baked munchies brand, has now turned to social media to crowdsource alternate retail inventory tracking so as to track stock and reinforce its sales and distribution network. And helping the brand crowdsource is Creativeland Asia.
Entertainment ticketing website Bookmyshow.com is quite bullish on growth. Ashish Hemrajani, Founder and CEO, Bigtree Entertainment, said, “Currently, we are selling 600,000 tickets per month online in India. Now, we are looking at growth outside the country. We are looking at five countries close to India and looking forward to strategic online ticketing community. While we are focussed on movies and plays, we are also identifying other avenues of entertainment. Ticketing experiences have improved. We are providing loyalty software and CRM (customer relationship management) to all multiplexes.”
Clea Public Relations has bagged the PR mandate for IMN News, the soon to be launched English news channel, which is currently known as NewsX. The mandate for Clea PR includes designing the channel’s new communication strategy, conceptualising communication and viewer engagement initiatives and handling corporate communications.
Alpenliebe continues with its light-hearted storytelling in its new TV campaign that brings out the monkey… er… fun girl in Kajol. The madari-monkey concept gets a twist with hilarious results, but does it work for brand Alpenliebe?
Mediascope Publicitas, the Swiss media consultancy, has appointed Gourav Tandon as COO for its newly launched out-of-home (OOH) vertical. Tandon had put in his papers at Navia Asia as Chief Operating Officer earlier in June 2010.
INQ Mobile, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Hutchison Whampoa, has launched its first ever campaign for India. Executed by MPG Active, the outdoor and activation division of Havas Media, the campaign involves setting up the tallest billboards in the NCR region of Gurgaon.
Prabhat Khabar, a daily published from Jharkhand, Bihar and West Bengal, has reduced its cover price in the state of Jharkhand from Rs 4 to Rs 2. Meanwhile, Prabhat Khabar has also launched a campaign, titled ‘Ab padega poora Jharkhand’, to support this price cut. The group has earmarked a budget of Rs 50-60 lakh for the new campaign, which will mostly use the OOH and radio mediums.
Hanoz Mogrelia has put in his papers at Saatchi & Saatchi as Creative Director after a decade-long stint with the agency. He is joining DDB Mudra, where he will be working closely with NCD Rajeev Raja. Mogrelia will be based out of Mumbai.
Speaking at Hindustan Times’ Mumbai First Conclave on June 15, 2010, Balki compared advertising professionals to film directors and said, “I haven’t seen a guy in advertising, including me, who knows what the consumer wants”. The Conclave also saw the relaunch of HT Café with the promise of more Bollywood coverage.
Suresh Bala has put in his papers at Zoom as CEO. He had been with Zoom since 2006. Bala now intends to start his own venture in the media space and said that he would be ready to talk about it in a week’s time. It could not be ascertained as to who would be replacing Bala at Zoom.
Monte Carlo, the brand from Oswal Woollen Mills Ltd, is scouting for a creative partner. It may be recalled that in October 2008, the account was won by JWT. However, it is learnt that JWT will not be taking part in the freshly called multi-agency pitch. Industry sources have pegged the account size in the region of Rs 15-20 crore.
The English movie genre has been growing slowly and steadily over the past few years. While the audience for this genre is limited, the channels are very optimistic about growth. The genre, which is led by Star Movies, saw the launch of a new channel WB some time back. exchange4media takes a look at what the current equation in the English movie genre is.