New Delhi: IPG Mediabrands, part of the Interpublic group of companies, will launch its market forecasting unit Magna in India next month, said Leigh Terry, CEO, IPG Mediabrands, APAC.
“India is in the top three markets in the APAC region and we are big in India… We want to continue to reinforce and grow our market position. (And) with the launch of Magna, take the next step in leveraging our scale in the country,” Terry added. China and Australia are the other counties in the top three apart from India.
The new entity will be headed by Hema Malik, COO, Lodestar UM and Arun Sharma, managing partner, Initiative, in India in addition to their current roles.
The company is also looking at some acquisitions in analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning space.
“The ability for the India marketplace to truly embrace data driven marketing is not there yet but is right on the cusp and that is why are looking at bringing Magna here and looking at acquisition,”
Magna is the centralised IPG Mediabrands agency that develops intelligence, investment and innovation strategies for agency teams and clients. The agency utilises key insights, forecasts and strategic relationships to provide clients with a competitive marketplace advantage.
While the agency has operational presence in India, after its launch all it work closely with all the brands that IPG works with. According to its predictions in 2017, advertising expenditure in India is estimated to grow 11.5 per cent to touch Rs 611 billion driven by sectors like social, fin-tech, and payment banks, telecom service, content distribution platforms in addition to FMCG, auto and ecommerce.
Terry added that the agency is looking at strengthening its customer relationship management (CRM) capabilities in India. “We have a strong CRM operation internally …and some of the things we have been talking internally is how we can ramp that up not just to extend what we are doing here. There are very few media agencies which have CRM within their portfolio.”
IPG Mediabrands India’s network of agencies includes Lodestar UM, Initiative, Interactive Avenues, Cadreon, Rapport and Ansible. It total billings across 130 countries is over $37 billion.
