Campaign India Agency Report Card 2010: Maxus

Type of agency Media

Company ownership WPP

Key personnel Ajit Varghese, MD, Deepak Gujrati, finance head, Kartik Sharma, Maxus West, Mausumi Kar, V Narayan, Maxus North, Sanchayeeta Verma, Maxus South, Priti Murti, national insights, Sidharth Parashar,national trading, Swati Mohan, head - ESP,Shashank Gawade, head - brand activation, Rajendra Dwivedi, head - new business development

Accounts won L’Oreal, Manappuram, Parle, ICI Paints, Max Bupa, Google, McNroe, Greenpeace, Viacom group, Neo Sports. Digital only: Vodafone, Kerala Tourism, Future Group

Accounts lost None reported

A good year for Maxus, which began with them bagging the Media Agency of the Year award at the Goafest 2010 Media Abbys with an 11-metal haul. Later in the year, the agency picked up the businesses of L’Oreal, all the Viacom18 brands, Manappuram, Parle and Greenpeace India operations. The wins are reportedly worth Rs 500-550 crores. During IPL season, Maxus and the Hindustan Times executed a print media innovation that gave readers a full page ad of the IPL team they chose to support through a text sent in the previous day. Maxus came in at second place at the Emvies, and Ajit Varghese said, quoting the Avis Car Rentals example, it’s something they’re happy about as it gets them to try harder.It does get more difficult as media agencies grow larger and older, and Maxus will feel it difficult to target those categories where the agency has no account. For the moment, they’re winning all they pitch for.

How Campaign India rates the agency: 9

How Maxus rates itself: 10

Maxus’ work continued to be recognised at industry forums like Goafest, Emvies, AdClub and won the highest number of metals in all the award functions in 2010. Some of the work like IPL’s eight ads in one print edition, Nokia Mobile Targeting, Vodafone Mirchi caller tunes, and the Red Bull F1 car made of cans, continue to break new barriers in use of media. Vodafone and Nokia continued to be the most awarded brand(s) at Media award functions for the second year in a row, and tribute of that is Nokia and Vodafone being the best brand and marketer of the year. Both continue to retain Maxus as the AOR in India, an exception across the world that makes us not only proud, but is also a huge motivation to continue with the motto of “make our work speak for our clients”.A hugely satisfying year with not just organic growth, but also highest-ever new business billing. Profile clients like L’Oreal, Parle, ICI paints, Max Bupa, and Google continue to put their trust in Maxus which makes it the only “dominant profile agency” in India over the last 5 years. Not just in India, Maxus continues to make its presence felt in South Asia with Telenor in Pakistan, Grameen Phone and Nestle in Bangladesh. Globally growing at over 25% under the able leadership of Kelly Clark.