After Malvika Mehra exits, Soumitra Karnik given additional responsibility as Dentsu India CCO

Following the recent exit of Malvika Mehra as CCO of Densu India, Dentsu Aegis Network (DAN) has entrusted Soumitra Karnik, currently Chief Creative Officer (CCO) at Dentsu Impact and macgarrybowen India, with the additional charge of CCO, Dentsu India. He will assume this role for Dentsu India, the full-service agency headquartered in Bangalore, with immediate effect, and will report into Agnello Dias (Aggi), Creative Chairman, DAN India.

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Under the expanded mandate, Karnik will lead Dentsu India’s creative output nationally and will be responsible for maintaining and amplifying a robust client-agency relationship for the agency across its offices in Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai and Kochi.

Agnello Dias

Speaking on the appointment, Aggi said, “I have known Soumitra for many years now and he is the sort of guy you could go to war with. Nothing fazes him. I have seen him take on the most absurd challenges with a happy fascination at having found a new puzzle to solve. He has that most rare of attributes in a creative person – his creative stamina, and I am sure he will go on to do more than justice to his new extended role.”

Elaborating on his new role, Karnik said, “Keeping the big-sounding designations aside, I am the same hungry and relentless creative person that I have always been. Lately, I find a lot of people from the industry complain about the prevalent diminishing standards and mediocrity everywhere; and while I am certainly not going to deny this, I also believe that the only way out of it is to roll up our sleeves, put our heads down, and get to work. That is exactly what we did when we were giving shape to Dentsu Impact a few years back. We won a lot of good clients and did a lot of good work which won us a battery of awards nationally and internationally.”

“I am fortunate to have worked very closely with some great clients and some amazingly talented team members. Without the support of both, consistently producing good work is just not possible. With the mandate and the freedom to build a strong creative culture at Dentsu India, what I now have is an incredibly exciting challenge and an opportunity – all rolled into one,” he added.

Narayan Devanathan

Narayan Devanathan, Chairperson, Creative Line of Business for DAN India, said, “Soumitra and I have been partners in crime for close to 9 years now, and I couldn’t be happier to have him now also lead the creative mandate at Dentsu India. Over the years, Dentsu India has grown to be one of the most stable partners any client could ask for. With this solid foundation, I’m sure Soumitra will help the agency scale new heights with a creativity-first approach.”

Karnik joined the network in 2012, playing a key role in the resurgence of the group’s creative reputation. Prior to that, he was an ECD at JWT. In over 11 years spent there, he worked on a variety of clients, including Pepsi, Airtel, Nestle and Hero Honda. Karnik has also worked at Lowe and Percept. Among his notable campaigns are ‘Pepsi Yeh Hai Youngistaan Meri Jaan’, Slice Aamsutra, ‘Yaari Ki Gaadi’ for Hero Honda Splendour NXG, and the ‘What Makes Us Click’ Campaign for Canon, to name a few.

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