MUMBAI, INDIA — Creative agency Wieden+Kennedy India continues to draw senior talent, ever since it opened its Mumbai office in mid-2022. This week, Kapil Batra has come aboard the “ship of fools,” as Dan Wieden famously referred to the agency he co-founded. Kapil joins as National Creative Director for India, reporting to Santosh Padhi. To begin with, his focus will be the Delhi office, which is where he will operate.
Over the two decades that he has spent in the industry, Kapil has been responsible for campaigns that have found their way into everyday speech such as the phenomenon that was PayTM Karo, the endearing Share a Coke campaign (Friend Request & Landlord), the imaginative and awarded Dettol soap bubbles activation, the widely shared Rudali campaign for Radio Mirchi, the much awarded PayTM Sweet Change activation and work for brands like Yatra.com, Maggi, Domino’s Pizza, Alpenliebe, Chlormint, Happydent, Flipkart, and Star Sports.
His work has been awarded at Cannes, Adfest, D&AD, Spikes, Clio, One Show, Mirchi Kaan, Goa Fest, and Effies. In his last role, he was heading creative for the Gurgaon office of McCann Erickson. Kapil is the latest in some notable senior-level hires made at W+K. Anirban Roy (Head of Strategy), Shreekant Srinivasan (Head of Business, Delhi) joined towards the end of last year. Ayesha Ghosh joined as President in July 2022. Santosh Padhi was the first in this resurgence, to join as CCO. A big win for the agency has been the Jio 5G account at the beginning of this year.
Kapil shared, “W+K has consistently created work that’s awe-inspiring. It is bold and rooted in culture. So when this opportunity to be a part of this truly creatively driven organization came, I got all excited. In my subsequent interactions with Paddy and Ayesha, where they spoke about their vision for W+K India, the culture, and more importantly, the vibes I got, everything was just fantastic. I am happy to join the talented team here and contribute to writing an exciting new chapter for W+K India.”
Santosh Padhi, CCO, said, “We are in the people business and people are the source of creativity and ideas. We were looking for a solid creative people’s person with a great depth of insights, ideas, and love for craft, we found all of these and many more in Kapil. After spending two decades in the industry, his passion and hunger to do more is what impressed us the most, his versatile body of work reflects human culture in a big way, which is one of the strong beliefs of W+K India and Global.”
Ayesha Ghosh, President, said, “When we saw the creative work that Kapil has been responsible for, we knew that we had to have him join us. Within the agency, we often talk of breaking out of ads and breaking into culture. That is what much of his work represents. And it doesn’t hurt that some of his campaigns have gone on to make a sizable difference to the brands they were created for! What completely sealed the deal for us over and above the work, is that Kapil is an incredibly nice, humble person, who lets his work speak for him. And we’re suckers for that.”
