Frank: Tell us about your time in
McCann.
Bharat: The McCann experience
was interesting.
It was very different to the ad
agencies of today. In those days as
an Account Director with a few
Account Executives under me you
had to do everything from media
planning and strategy, to traffic
management and so what was
needed was to have relationships
with your creative people, with the
clients and everybody else.
The learning curve was very
different to today’s scenario and
you had to get a lot more involved
in terms of understanding the
sales cycles, distribution, and other
details on a number of issues.
Today we don’t get involved in
these issues as clients have become
more sophisticated.
Frank: A lot of people in the
audience will identify with your
next move where you broke
from your career to go into
entrepreneurship. Tell us about
this time.
Bharat: Going into business
was not done because it was an
intelligent thing to do but because
it was the fashionable thing to
do. It was something that was
expected of everyone and so it
was the next natural action in my
career progression.
It was a time when I had just got
married and so I took one small
office in which I had to worry
about how I was going to pay the
rent and fuel, for which we didn’t
have enough money. It was me
alone in the office and with faith
and conviction the courage to
continue just came and we did it,
it was no big deal.
Frank: How was Scanad in the
first years? Was it a flying start
from the outset?
62 MAL 12/16 ISSUE
‘‘ I started an
advertising agency
with my vision and
dream being to create
an agency that spreads
tentacles across
Africa. I wanted to
grow the business
that would outlive
my person. It wasn’t
about making money.
The money comes as
an incidental to doing
a good job - it wasn’t
the main goal or
objective.’’
yourself with others in the world
you realize that there are those
that have achieved a lot more than
you have and it’s important to keep
your feet on the ground.
Bharat: No, it was actually quite
a struggle just like any other
business. The first company I
setup was Scan Ad + Marketing
as I thought I would become a
Marketing Consultant. The lesson
I learnt here is that you cannot do
everything and it is important to
specialize in one line of expertise.
The main reason we did the IPO
was that at that time none of the
multinational advertising agencies
was interested in Africa. They were
focused on the BRICS nations
which are China, Brazil, India,
Russia and South Africa.
It is important that you be able
to add value, volume and sales to
your client in whatever proposal
or idea you give them. If you fail
to add these you are history. If you
can add these then you will be a
star.
Frank: What are some of the
more humbling moments that
you have gone through? Those
that you look back on and can’t
believe you got through?
Bharat: I think a humbling
moment is one you have to reta in
all the time. I try to remind myself
that at the end of the day it’s just
a business. When you compare
It’s important to remain focused,
involved, and close to your people
especially those that have helped
you get to where you’ve got to.
Frank: Tell us about the
ScanGroup IPO. Were you
worried that you would lose
control over the business that
you’ve created over many years,
with its personality and character
changing to accommodate the
many new shareholders?
Bharat: Yes absolutely. The
advantage we had is that we had
done a lot of previous work for a
lot of IPOs such as National Bank,
Uchumi, Kenya Airways, Sameer
Africa, KCB among others as an
advertising agency and so we knew
the process.
We had the Lowe franchise and
had a relationship with both WPP
and IPG but they were not really
focused on Africa which in their
eyes was a long way away from
attracting their interest, in addition
to being a difficult market and not
their main priority.
For me it had always been my
dream and my vision to make
Scanad a truly pan-African brand
and doing the IPO would give me
the advantage where I could use
stock as currency which is what
we’ve done.
If you look at the history of how
we’ve grown, in the first year in
2006 after the IPO our turnover
was three billion, we’re now at 16