Dentsu Aegis Network launches Amplifi in Malaysia to be led by MD Hasnain Babrawala

Dentsu Aegis Network Malaysia has launched Amplifi, the network’s global media investment arm. The launch marks the continued expansion of Amplifi, now in eight markets across Asia Pacific and 39 countries worldwide.

Amplifi’s collaborative approach will see it engaging with 13 media, digital and communications agencies across the Dentsu Aegis group in Malaysia. In this new structure, Amplifi effectively brings together the group’s media trading and investment management, media partnerships, programmatic buying (Amnet) and content capability functions (The Story Lab) into a consolidated unit, with data as its foundation.

Driving the expansion of Amplifi in the region, Sunil Yadav, President, Amplifi Asia Pacific said, “Officially establishing Amplifi in Malaysia is crucial. Our regional office has been working with the Malaysian teams on several initiatives, which gave us a cursory look into the market readiness and its potentials to further drive convergence through media. In this respect, we are only touching the tip of the iceberg in terms of what we can do for clients and media owners in Malaysia. Our new way of engaging with media partners puts us in a differentiated position versus other agency groups. With that, we are excited to explore new innovative partnerships, under the able leadership of Hasnain, so watch this space!”

Commenting on the launch of Amplifi, Nicky Lim, CEO, Dentsu Aegis Network Malaysia said, “This is an important milestone for Dentsu Aegis Network Malaysia. Amplifi is our game-changing solution that will form a matrix that integrates four key areas of our trade – media investment, media partnerships, technology and innovative content solutions – to ultimately deliver a value proposition that works for our clients and media owners. This is how the power of collaboration is enabling us to pull ahead of our competition.”

Leading Amplifi will be its newly-appointed Managing Director, Hasnain Babrawala (pictured above). With solid media experience in multiple markets across Asia, Babrawala joins from IPG Mediabrands Malaysia where he was the Head of Media Trading and Innovation, handling the agency’s crucial task of optimising and monetising clients’ media budgets among others. He has led and worked on key accounts like Intel, Unilever, Johnson & Johnson, Reckitt Benckiser, just to name a few. Prior to IPG, he was attached with Omnicom Media (OMD) and Mindshare Fulcrum.

“The Amplifi approach to building relationships with media partners is refreshing, as it does not pivot only on the conventional tenets of investment management and accountability. Amplifi is redefining trading, I call it Gen-Y trading,” Babrawala said.

“Investments in areas like content, programmatic, data, new technology and artificial intelligence are set to increase, hence it is critical for trading units to be equipped and manage this continuous investment fragmentation smartly. I also believe that trading will not only be limited to price guarantees and will start, if not already, to feature as a measurable function for its overall solution in all agency evaluations and contracts. I look forward to grow with Dentsu Aegis Network Malaysia,” he added.

In his new role, Babrawala will have a mandate to fulfill Amplifi’s goal of delivering a demonstrable uplift in media performance across TV, Print, Digital, Radio and OOH on a global basis.

Babrawala will have dual reporting to Lim and Yadav.