Can Ellerton & Co’s cross-border PR corridor redefine Asia’s communications playbook?

In a year reshaping the balance of power across Asian trade and communications, Ellerton & Co. Public Relations has picked a decisive moment to enter India. In September, the communications firm announced its expansion with the appointment of Sanil Shirsat as India lead and associate director for APAC. The company frames the move as part of its ‘Greater Southeast Asia’ (GSA) vision, an ambition to build a cross-border communications corridor linking India with Southeast Asia and, ultimately, the wider Asia-GCC arc.

The agency now steps into one of the world’s most hotly contested public relations markets. India’s communications landscape is defined by the presence of multinational networks including Havas PR Pundit, Edelman and Ogilvy, alongside entrenched domestic players led by Madison, Adfactors and Kaizzen.

For Shirsat—whose two-decade career spans Weber Shandwick, MSLGroup, Archetype, and leadership of the Frontier Tech practice at Adfactors PR—the mandate is to establish Ellerton & Co.’s India operation, drive regional growth, and advise emerging-market and multinational clients across APAC.

The expansion adds India to a footprint that already includes Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Thailand—markets forming one of the world’s fastest-advancing trading blocs. Executive director Prayaank Gupta framed the move as a structural play rather than opportunism.

“Our expansion into India is a pivotal moment for Ellerton & Co. It not only strengthens our footprint but also launches our Greater Southeast Asia vision, spanning East Asia, India, the Middle East, and ASEAN,” he said. The firm has indicated that it aims to “connect Southeast Asia and India, two regions with strong synergies”, supported by recent new-business mandates across both markets.

Trade shifts and a new communications geography

For founder and director Oliver Ellerton, who has worked across Asia since January 2010, the GSA vision is not a brand narrative but a response to shifting trade structures. Client demand, he argues, has surged due to realignments in supply chains and capital flows accelerated by geopolitical tension.

“Our vision extends beyond Southeast Asia (SEA) to encompass the SEA-India-GCC arc. There is substantial demand from clients seeking not just SEA, but also India and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) markets,” he tells Campaign. Oliver points to the continuing trade disruption from US-China tensions and subsequent tariff and manufacturing shifts as a catalyst for this demand.

Evidence supports the assessment. According to a report by the Indian High Commission in Singapore, during 2024-2025 the island nation accounted for nearly 28% of India’s total trade with ASEAN, a share expected to rise as companies diversify manufacturing and logistics exposure. Singapore Prime Minister Lawrence Wong’s recent comments about the need for ‘like-minded, trade-dependent economies’ to deepen exchanges further underline this emerging architecture.

As markets integrate economically, however, Oliver argues that communications have not kept pace. Public relations (PR), unlike product or supply-chain expansion, cannot be industrialised.

“This is where the true challenge lies: understanding, in great detail, the nuances of each publication, from large outlets like The Times of India to industry publications like Campaign, as well as influencers and key opinion leaders. Each has its own audience, editorial priorities, and content style,” he notes.

In Southeast Asia, such complexity expands exponentially. The perception of ASEAN as a unified market is, he argues, fundamentally flawed. The region comprises 11 countries with different political, cultural, linguistic and regulatory realities.

“It’s not something that can be rushed or replicated easily,” Oliver adds, contrasting Vietnam’s media ecosystem with Singapore’s tightly regulated environment or the Philippines’ influencer-driven communications model. He suggests that expanding Indian brands will increasingly see Southeast Asia as a first-run growth region due to familiarity and cultural proximity.

“SEA is an increasingly attractive region for Indian brands, primarily because of its strong cultural ties, especially within the Indian diaspora across countries like Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia,” he notes. He cites Malaysia’s introduction of ASEAN Business Entity (ABE) status in 2026, which will ease cross-border talent and corporate mobility, as another accelerant.

But Oliver argues that misunderstanding works both ways. “The misconception that ASEAN is a single, unified market is a significant barrier,” he says, before adding that India is equally misread by global entrants. The country isn’t a single market, but a vast mosaic of diverse states, cities, languages, and cultural norms. The key to a successful market entry in India, he stresses, lies in recognising these differences and developing a nuanced approach that resonates with local audiences.

Scaling without acquisition

Amid the rush of agency consolidation across Asia—mergers, private-equity rollups and integration plays—Ellerton & Co. plans to take a contrarian path. When asked how the company will maintain consistency without aggressive acquisition, Oliver responded, “From the outset, our growth strategy has been organic. Our company culture, service standards, and quality of service are non-negotiable. If this means slower growth, then so be it.”

The agency also intends to prioritise clients aligned with its long-term approach. “Our clients tend to stay with us for the long haul because they recognise the true value of PR,” he adds.

In India, that strategy will be tested in an environment where scale and pricing pressures are fierce. Yet Shirsat argues that competition is an opening rather than an obstacle. “India is undoubtedly a fiercely competitive market, dominated by large domestic players, but I see this not as a barrier, but as a clear opportunity for Ellerton & Co. to offer something fundamentally different: a seamless, cross-border communications corridor,” he said.

Rather than going head-to-head with domestic networks on sheer volume, he positions the firm’s regional alignment as a differentiator: “We aren’t trying to beat domestic giants at their own game… Our structure is built for the pace of Asia's digital-first economies.”

For India operations, he sets a growth benchmark beyond revenue. “For our first-year growth metric, beyond the standard revenue targets, the core benchmark will be securing a critical mass of multi-market mandates,” Shirsat added.

Shirsat’s experience leading communications for IBM, Tata Communications and ServiceNow shapes his strategy. He identifies two principles necessary to build regional PR capability: cognitive flexibility and organisational nuance. “One is about systemisation and the other is about decentralisation,” he added.

To support cross-border execution, he argues that communications infrastructure—not messaging rhetoric—must adapt. “Ellerton & Co.'s India practice won't just offer an introduction; we'll provide a structurally sound, integrated support architecture that simplifies the complexity of the region.”

Execution, he insists, will be grounded locally. Its ‘new-age’ model will be powered by specialist on-ground teams in every key market, from Manila to Mumbai, not a distant centralised office.

AI, authenticity and the next battleground

The communications industry is undergoing structural change. India’s PR landscape is being reshaped by multilingual content demand, accelerated by generative AI adoption and rising vulnerability to misinformation, particularly in tech, fintech and sustainability sectors.

Shirsat argues the effect is transformative, “AI is certainly leading to the recomposition of the PR agency model… the agency of the future [will be] leaner, sharper, and faster.”

Yet he believes technology will elevate, not replace, human judgment. “I firmly believe in the enduring power of earned media… the ultimate premium is placed on the distinctly human capabilities of nuance, emotional intelligence, and the strategic human judgment required to be the ultimate curator of trust,” he added.

This authenticity will hinge on linguistic and cultural specificity rather than machine-generated scale. Noting his fluency in English, Hindi, Konkani and Marathi, Shrisat added, “True localisation requires more than just translation; it requires deep local knowledge, language skills, and an understanding of cultural norms.”

Ellerton predicts that geopolitical and media volatility will heighten demand for crisis and issues-based advisory. And with the transition to a multi-polar world likely to create significant turbulence, flexibility will be essential for PR agencies.

The agency is betting on depth over speed, and cross-border storytelling over domestic scale. But in India—the world’s most competitive PR proving ground—whether that philosophy can endure will be tested in the next 18 months.

For those watching Asia’s communications map redrawn in real time, the more pressing question is not whether the GSA corridor materialises, but whether it reshapes the region’s strategic playbook or simply becomes another contested frontier in an industry where advantage evaporates quickly.

Either way, the battle lines are set. And the outcome will reveal whether the future of Asian communications belongs to networks built on acquisition or those built on adjacency.