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Wunderman Thompson Malaysia CEO exits
21 Aug
Saurabh Saksena, former managing director, J Walter Thompson Malaysia has returned to India and joined Red Fuse Communications as president.
Red Fuse is an integrated WPP communications team exclusively set up for Colgate Palmolive. He will be based out of Mumbai. Sources close to the development have confirmed the news.
Saksena will lead the profit and loss of the agency.
Prior to taking up the role at Red Fuse Communications in India, he was serving as managing director at JWT Malaysia. He took up the Malaysia role in 2016 and was later elevated as the Group CEO for Ogilvy and JWT, when the two agencies combined their forces in 2017.
A few months later, when two agencies returned to function individually, Saksena was elevated as CEO, Wunderman Thompson Malaysia.
Prior to moving to Malaysia, Saksena was JWT Delhi’s senior vice president and chief growth officer based in Gurgaon. He also worked in Ogilvy India as account director.
During his tenure with JWT, he led business verticals such as Thompson Social and JWT Star.
He led JWT India’s communication for development sector and also established rural communications division with capabilities in rural planning, creative and implementation.
Saksena also worked on the mandate for identifying and engaging with organisations to drive mergers and acquisitions at JWT India.
He has over 25 years of experience and has worked across different agencies such as Clarion Communications, Ogilvy, Mudra, DDB Mudra Communications, Midday and JWT.
Saksena worked as a publisher for Midday Bangalore edition between 2005 and 2007. During this time, he was responsible for the profit and loss of the edition, which included sales and distribution, marketing, print/production, digital offering, and others.
He spent six years in Mudra and worked on brands including McDonald’s and Reliance Energy. He worked on the launch of several new foods and beverages, city restaurants, loyalty programmes, local store marketing programmes, brand promotions, kids’ programmes, health initiatives, Ronald McDonald charity events, along with market research initiatives.
Later in 2005, he was elevated as Branch Head, DDB Mudra Bangalore and was responsible for the profit and loss of the office.
The agency office won several awards and grew strongly under his leadership. It also turned as the lead agency for United Spirits during this time.
During his career, he worked on a slew of brand categories such as FMCG, retail, food and beverages, technology, telecom and mobiles, automotive, e-commerce.
These include brand such as McDonald’s, Pepsi, Slice, Mirinda, Mountain Dew, Tropicana, Lay’s, Kurkure, McDonald’s, Videocon, Motorcycle and Scooter brands of Hero MotoCorp, Nestle KitKat, Nestle Munch, Airtel, Nokia/ Microsoft, Askme.com, Askmebazaar.com, Hewlett Packard, Oracle, retail brands of Future Group, TTK Prestige, Peter England and liquor brands of United Spirits.
