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My advertising career is just beginning. Piyush Pandey is my inspiration not comparison, says Tanmay Bhat
Tanmay Bhat reacts to Storyboard18's story about him potentially becoming the new creative king of Indian advertising.
"I studied advertising in college and folks like Piyush Pandey and Prasoon Joshi were stalwarts who inspired me to be a part of advertising in the first place," Bhat told us. (Image sourced from Instagram)
The Storyboard18 piece published Monday morning about Tanmay Bhat possibly becoming the next face of Indian advertising and succeeding the one and only Piyush Pandey as the new creative king, has created a huge stir in the industry. There's praise and panic pouring in from all quarters of the creative industry. Tanmay Bhat himself had this to say: "A comparison between me - an absolute newcomer, and a legend like Piyush is absolutely unfair."
Bhat's meteoric rise in the creative world is undeniable and brands, especially startups, have been clamouring to work with him. A feat only achieved by a few in advertising, including Pandey and Prasoon Joshi, the renowned lyricist, writer and boss of McCann Worldgroup. Bhat, however, doesn't see himself as the successor to legends like them. He told us, "I studied advertising in college and folks like Piyush Pandey and Prasoon Joshi were stalwarts who inspired me to be a part of advertising in the first place."
Bhat added, "I think my career in the world of advertising is just beginning and I’m just very very lucky on two fronts: I get to work with some very very gutsy founders and brands. And secondly I have an extremely talented team - Puneet Chadha, Deep Joshi and Vishal Dayama have been working with me and Devaiah Bopanna for almost a decade now, and honestly they do most of the heavy lifting. But since my name gets the clicks, I suppose I am often given credit for their work :)”
Bhat and his team worked on ad campaigns for popular brands that turned absolutely viral. He rose to mainstream fame in Indian advertising for his work for fin-tech brand CRED. Yes, we all remember those CRED ads that became oh, so popular for their vagueness and the gundagiri of Rahul Dravid. From IPL campaigns for Disney+ Hotstar and Smallcase featuring SRK and MS Dhoni, to the Lenskart ads with Karan Johar, to seeing chess grandmaster Viswanathan Anand sweating his glands off for Subway and the most recent parody on Indian TV soaps for BoldCare, featuring Ranveer Singh, Bhat has made a significant mark for himself.
SPOTLIGHT
At the Storyboard18 DNPA Conclave 2025, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw spotlighted the critical role of traditional media in an evolving digital landscape. He emphasized that such gatherings can aid the govt in formulating more effective policies for a balanced and sustainable media ecosystem.
Read MoreIN PHOTOS: At Global Pioneers Summit, visionaries chart the future of business and creativity
From the chiefs of Nestle, Diageo, Colgate, PepsiCo, Zetwerk and CRED to AI visionaries, marketing mavens, top creators, ad legends and leading global agencies' CEOs, the brightest minds converged at the Storyboard18 Global Pioneers Summit for an action-packed day of meaningful dialogues on creativity, commerce and culture.