Anand has announced that he is leaving his position as vice-president, strategy and knowledge, Bates 141, to start out on his own. He plans to operate independently as a brand consultant or, as he puts it, a “brand mentor”.
Commenting on his decision, Narasimha said, “I have been in this industry for more than 20 years now. After so many years of working for others, I thought the time was right to start my own work. I’ll act as a brand consultant for my clients and share with them my expertise in brand navigation.”
He also explained, “Though brands have their own brand managers, a major portion of their time goes into marketing solutions because of which they are unable to focus on developing brand strategy. Also, most of them need an external and independent point of view on their brand’s growth. I realised that this was a good opportunity for me to start out on my own.”
Narasimha has cross-category experience, having worked on FMCG, durables, services, corporates, technology and lifestyle brands. He describes his areas of expertise as brand management and strategy, integrated marketing communications, and shopper and retail marketing.
He says that he plans to work directly with select clients and has no plans to start a company. He is already in talks with some major companies.
Narasimha holds a Master’s in behavioural sciences from BITS Pilani and a brand management specialisation from IIM Calcutta. In addition to Bates 141, he has worked in account planning and management with agencies such as JWT, McCann, Enterprise-Nexus, Contract and Saatchi & Saatchi.
Talking about a campaign which was special to him, he says, “I used to work for Tara Sinha Associates, which was later acquired by McCann Erickson. I did a campaign there for the brand, Milkmaid. The brand used to be positioned as a milk substitute and the increasing milk supply in the country was hurting it. We repositioned the brand as a dessert ingredient and the success of the idea is proved by the fact that Milkmaid still retains this positioning.”
Other campaigns he remembers fondly are the Sony Ericsson mobile one and the Kapil Dev one for Boost.
Narasimha teaches brand management at leading B-schools in the country. His decision will allow him more time to devote to this passion.