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Kartik Smetacek shifts to Draft FCB Ulka
Smetacek has bagged awards across various award fests and his work has also been recognized in various journals
Kartik Smetacek, senior creative director, Publicis Ambience has decided to turn a new leaf. He is joining Draft FCB Ulka as creative director.
KS Chakravarthy aka Chax, national creative director, Draft FCB Ulka tells afaqs! that he has interacted for nearly four years with Smetacek while they were at Rediffusion Y&R.
"He is very versatile and is strongly an ideas-driven guy. There are few good print writers - and he is one of them. The accounts that we have in Mumbai need such talent. He is definitely going to be a key and valuable addition to the team," says Chax.
Smetacek will be the fourth creative director to join the Mumbai office of the agency, the other three being Harish Murjani, Bhushan Pandit and Samir Chondkar. Some of the accounts that he will oversee include Tata Motors, Tata Docomo, Zee Cafe and Zee Studio. He will also pitch in for other major clients in Delhi and Bengaluru, if needed.
Smetacek joined Publicis Ambience last year as senior creative director, when Nikhil Panjwani was also roped in as associate creative director. He was looking after the accounts of Lakme, Lakme Salon, Westside, Tata Indicom Broadband, HDFC Mutual Funds and Capgemini.
Earlier, he was at Ideas@work for a year and worked for businesses including Reid and Taylor, Stephens Brothers, Vividha, Bigadda.com, The Great Maratha Corporation and Kama Schachter.
Before that, he worked at Contract Advertising for a year. Accounts such as DNA (all supplements), Halls, HSBC, Listerine, Cadbury Eclairs Crunch, Arcelia and Travelguru.com were some of the brands that he was taking care of at the agency.
Smetacek began his career in advertising with Rediffusion Y&R (Rediffusion DY&R at the time) in 2000. During his six year stint at the agency, he worked on businesses such as Airtel, Taj Hotels, Colgate-Palmolive, Franklin Templeton, Citibank, Exide, Tata Corporate, Tata Sky, Tata Motors and Anacin.
He has won accolades at award fests such as Goafest and the Abby's. His work for the Airtel Express Yourself campaign in 2004 grabbed various awards. His work has also been featured the in D&AD Telecom Showcase and Neil French's Y&R book.