Karishma Initiative, headed by Amita Karwal, eyes Rs 1,000-crore billing

Lintas Group has appointed Amita Karwal as head for Delhi operations for its newly launched media service agency, Karishma Initiative.

After Lintas Media Group and Aaren Initiative, Karishma Initiative is Lintas Group’s third offering in the media space.

Karishma Initiative has been launched with a view to cater to clients who work with global templates and will help offer more flexibility to a new set of advertisers.

The agency already has business worth Rs 500 crore, including the UAE-based Etisalat DB account in the telecom space. Within two quarters, the media service agency targets to raise a similar amount at its two offices, Delhi and Mumbai.

Karwal, operating out of the Lintas office at Gurgaon, is coming on board as executive vice-president, Karishma Initiative. She has 18 years of work experience, including stints at Initiative Media, Ogilvy and ZenithOptimedia.

She has worked on accounts such as LG, Maruti, Gillette, Nestlé, Reckitt, and Hewlett Packard. In an official communiqué, she says that the combination of Lintas Group’s worldwide network and tools and indigenous relationships will help her and the team to bring in early success.

In the near future, NP Sathyamurthy, president and chief operating officer, Lintas Media Group will take charge of Karishma Initiative as chief executive officer. “Karishma Initiative gives us the opportunity to create a new agency with a character that is different from Lintas Media Group. Any new agency must be lean, agile, hungry and predatory in order to win new business consistently. And that’s what we want Karishma Initiative to be,” shares Sathyamurthy.