Sandeep Goyal


Sandeep Goyal is an Indian businessperson, media entrepreneur and author. He is the founder and current chairman of the Mogae Group. He was also the founder-chairman and former JV partner of Dentsu in India and Middle East. He has been in the advertising, media and digital industry for over 36 years.

Early life

Sandeep Goyal was born in Amritsar, Punjab on 5 December 1962. He did his schooling at St. John’s High School, Chandigarh. He has his college degree from D.A.V. College, Chandigarh, with Honors in English Literature. He topped the Panjab University that year and was awarded a Gold medal. At college, he was a debater, with a long list of inter-college and University prizes to his credit. Sandeep went on to do his MBA from FMS Delhi. In 2018, he completed his PhD. from FMS Delhi.

Family

Sandeep’s parents were both senior officers in the government. His father, Dr. S L Goyal, from the first batch of BITS Pilani, is an M. Tech from Punjab Engineering College and a PhD in Electrical Engineering. He retired as Chief Engineer from the Punjab State Electricity Board.
Sandeep’s mother, Mrs. Kailash Goyal, retired from the IAS, having served as Director Food & Civil Supplies, Director Local Government, Labour Commissioner Punjab and adorned many other key posts in her 35 years long innings in civil service.
Sandeep and his wife Tanya Goyal set up the Kailasham Arts Trust in 2015 for promotion of the Indian arts.
Sandeep has a daughter Carol, who is a lawyer by training.

Career

Sandeep Goyal began his career with a paint company, Goodlass Nerolac Paints, as a sales manager in 1984. After that, he began his journey in advertising with HTA as an account executive in 1986. After stints at Trikaya and Interact Vision, he went on to become President of Rediffusion DY&R between 1997 and 2001. Post that, he was Group CEO of the Zee Group between 2001-2002. In 2003, Goyal signed a JV with Dentsu. Dentsu Inc. of Japan and the Indian joint-venture with Mogae crossed Rs1200 crores in capitalized billings in 2010-11. Sandeep sold his 26% stake in the India JV in Jan 2011. He continued as Chairman Emeritus for another 18 months, finally demitting charge in September 2012.
In 2008, Sandeep partnered The Times of India Group, in a 50:50 JV, to create The Indian Fantasy League. This company is now fully owned by the Mogae Group. In 2009, Goyal launched an website named Last Minute Inventory, the world’s first online media trading exchange, in partnership with Dentsu, Star TV, Zee Group & TOI Group. In 2010, the exchange transacted Rs. 67 crores of business, and was profitable.
Mogae Consultants is an investment vehicle for Goyal and his wife, Tanya Goyal. Some of their investments include Turmeric Vision, which operates Food Food channel in partnership with chef Sanjeev Kapoor, a customer relationship management company, a digital agency and a media market place Last Minute Inventory. Other investments include creative boutique startup The Mob and PR firms Torque and Midori.

Life after Dentsu

In 2012, Sandeep Goyal launched Mogae Media, a mobile monetization company that won exclusive rights to handle the entire m-advertising, m-couponing, and m-commerce for Airtel. Mogae Media received Rs 100 crores of PE funding in 2013 from Renuka Ramnath’s Multiples PE Fund.
In 2015, Sandeep Goyal launched Tango Media, a subsidiary of Mogae Media to sell StarStar, a new product that he developed in-house. 12 brands tied-up with the company for this service to ensure that customers can directly reach the brand from their mobile. A user just had to dial Bank on his keypad to reach Yes Bank or Paint for more information from Kansai Nerolac Paints. The service was rolled out on 1 April 2016 and requires no smartphone, data or app download. In 2015 Mogae Media inked a JV with Zeotap GmbH of Berlin, Germany for programmatic advertising.
In October 2015, Mogae Media got into an exclusive marketing tie-up with Israeli start-up Idomoo. In November 2016, Mogae Media acquired personalised video platform Ao1 from Ashish Dabral in a share-swap deal.
In December 2016 Mogae Media acquired Ngage, the ad-tech platform of Nimbuzz BV, a Netherlands-based over-the-top content firm in an all-stock deal valued at Rs 40 crore
In 2017, Mogae Media picked up 10% stake in Sync Media, a company with a new-age digital buying platform.
Since 2019, Sandeep Goyal has set up a think tank, the Indian Institute of Human Brands, that tracks celebrities and analyses their relevance to brands.
In 2019, Sandeep also set up another think-tank, the Forum for Ethical Use of Data.

Books

Sandeep wrote ‘The Dum Dum Bullet’ on the business of advertising. The book was published by Penguin Group in 2004. In 2013, Sandeep co-authored his second book, ‘You’re Hired!’ with his daughter Carol. In 2014 he published the book ‘Konjo: The Fighting Spirit’ published by Harper Collins. Konjo is a book centered on entrepreneurship, describing in detail, Sandeep Goyal’s professional years from 2003 to 2011. The book chronicles Sandeep’s joint venture with Dentsu and what working with the Japanese is like. In 2019, Sandeep published three books: Blogbuster, a compilation of his blogs in Campaign; Honest to God, a compilation of his columns in Business India; and Japan Made Easy, a book with 101 essays on Japanese business, culture and everyday life.

Awards and recognition

Sandeep Goyal was actively involved with the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, New York and MIP TV in 2001- 2002. He was the first Indian on the jury of the Global Emmy Awards.

Philanthropy

In 2018, Sandeep Goyal instituted an Endowment of Rs. 1 crore at his school, St. John’s Chandigarh. He already funds the Ranvijay Singh Awards at the school.
Goyal’s Kailasham Trust currently sponsors the Matka Chowk in Chandigarh and is putting up a huge public installation at the Chowk.

Columnist

He’s been writing for newspapers since 1994. He wrote a fortnightly column, ‘Perfect 10’ for The Hindu Business Line and another fortnightly column called ‘Horse Sense’ for The Financial Express in the mid to late 90s. Since 2015, he’s been writing a column titled "Honest to God" for Business India. The column is a no-holds-barred piece on events and individuals in the news. Sandeep has been writing a column, “Yes, But …” in Business Standard since 2019. He has been writing, “Here’s The Pitch”, an advertising review column in The New Indian Express since 2019. In 2020, he is writing a series, “Future Shock” for Economic Times’ Brand Equity. He is also, starting 2020, writing “Fifty-Fifty” a column in BW Business World. His blogs continue to be carried in Campaign. In 2018, he used to write a weekly blog for Exchange4Media, 'Ask the Doctor'
on career planning and job issues.