Kapil Arora takes charge as Group CEO at Ogilvy Indonesia

JAKARTA: Ogilvy has handed the keys of its Indonesia business to Kapil Arora, appointing the veteran advertising executive as group ceo, a move that underscores the agency’s bet on experienced leadership in one of South-east Asia’s most competitive creative markets.

Arora’s elevation comes two years after he moved to Jakarta as chief operating officer in January 2024. His promotion signals continuity rather than disruption, rewarding a career built on scaling businesses, building brands and running complex, multi-market operations.

A full-stack brand-builder with more than 25 years of cross-category and cross-border experience, Arora has worked across Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and now Jakarta, holding independent P&L responsibilities for the past 17 years. His track record blends creative ambition with commercial discipline, a mix Ogilvy values as agencies wrestle with digital-first clients and margin pressure.

In India, Arora is best known for his role in launching Vodafone and leading its national integrated brand team at Ogilvy, a stint that produced some of the country’s most recognisable advertising, including the Zoozoos, Happy to Help and Blackberry Boys campaigns. From 2013 to 2019, he led ogilvy group’s north India operations, a period marked by record new business wins, the network’s strongest showing at Cannes and the Delhi office growing to its largest-ever scale.

He also played a central role in behaviour-change communications for government programmes, helping set up the centre for social and behaviour change communication in collaboration with the Gates Foundation, Ashoka, Harvard universities and WPP.

In late 2019, Arora took on the role of co-chairman and ceo of 82.5 communications, WPP India’s youngest creative agency. Despite being born during the pandemic, the agency was built into a profitable second pillar within the Ogilvy roster in under four years, with a distinct client base and reputation for creative effectiveness.

Over his career, Arora has worked on an expansive list of Indian and global brands, including Raymond, TVS, Unilever teas, BCCL, Titan, Vodafone, KFC, Pizza Hut, Pernod Ricard, Perfetti, Dabur, Sprite, Uber, BMW, Himalaya, ACC, Nestlé, Kimberly-Clark and Indonesia’s Kawan Lama, among others. His work has won multiple honours, including three WPP global partnership in practice awards, Cannes Lions and Effies.

Alongside industry leadership, Arora remains deeply engaged in academia. He serves on the academic board of the Jagran Lake Institute of Media Studies and has taught at IIM Calcutta for over a decade, while regularly guest lecturing at other management institutes.

Now, as group ceo of Ogilvy Indonesia, Arora inherits a market that is young, digital-first and fiercely contested. His brief is clear: grow the business, sharpen the creative edge and prove that big agencies can still move fast. If his past is any guide, he is unlikely to take the scenic route.