RajDeepak Das appointed CCO at Leo Burnett

RajDeepak Das has been appointed as the chief creative officer (CCO) of Leo Burnett India. Das will be based in Mumbai and will be working closely with Saurabh Varma, chief executive officer, Leo Burnett Group India, informed an agency statement. 

 

Das replaces KV Sridhar who will leave the agency on 4 May 2014, after a stint of 17 years.

 

Mark Tutssel, chief creative officer, Leo Burnett Worldwide, said, “Raj brings with him an exuberant amount of global experience, creativity, focus and best-in-class leadership. He understands today’s creative landscape is always-on and always integrated. The decision to bring Raj on board as our CCO holds immense promise for our clients and our creative product. I strongly believe that Raj, alongside Saurabh will form a perfect unity of creative and strategy, making the agency, one of India’s leading creative agencies today, the best integrated agency in the region going forward.” 

 

Jarek Ziebinski, president, Leo Burnett Asia Pacific, said, “The appointment of Raj and his partnership with Saurabh represents a new beginning and milestone for Leo Burnett India. India’s growing importance as an economic force on the world stage and its rapid change from a traditionally print and TV dominated market to one that will see online ad market reach USD 1.12 billion next year are key indicators of transformation in our clients’ businesses. We are focused on ensuring that Leo Burnett is at the forefront of this change, with the agility to meet the needs of today’s marketers. I have no doubt that under the combined power of Saurabh’s strategy and Raj’s creative leadership, they will be able to jointly take the agency to the next level and evolve into the new model of HumanKind communications company. Both of them will have the full support of the network to make Leo Burnett the fastest growing and most creative integrated agency in India."

 

Varma said, “Five months back we communicated our intention to be the best integrated communication company in India. With the appointment of Raj, we have made a decisive step in that direction. Raj and I will partner to create work that is not only human, but also partcipative by design. We will focus on work which brings out the purpose of our brands. Ultimately, the route to building the most popular brands is in creating work which creates believers not just consumers." 

 

On his move Das said, “I always believed that ‘Agencies don’t create iconic brands, people do.’ And that is what Leo Burnett stands for. In Leo Burnett I want to bring in new trends of communications to make our brands future ready."

 

Prior to this, Das was ECD at BBDO. 

 

Also read: Leo Burnett announces KV Sridhar’s exit