Sandeep Goyal (born 5 December 1962 in Amritsar, Punjab, India) 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. At the end of April, 2021, he purchased a 100% stake in Rediffusion and Everest, two of India’s largest independent agencies, and took charge as Managing Director. He has been in the advertising, media and digital industry for over 37 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 (1977). He has his college degree from D.A.V. College, Chandigarh, with Honors in English Literature. He topped the Panjab University that year (1982) 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. Goyal went on to do his MBA from FMS Delhi (1984). In 2018, he completed his PhD. from FMS Delhi.
Family
Goyal'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.
Goyal'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.
Goyal and his wife Tanya Goyal set up the Kailasham Arts Trust in 2015 for promotion of the Indian arts.
Goyal has a daughter Carol, who is a lawyer by training.
Career
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 (now Wunderman Thompson, J. Walter Thompson) as an account executive in 1986. After stints at Trikaya (now Grey) and Interact Vision (part of DDB Mudra), 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. Goyal 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, Goyal partnered with 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 (ClozR Communications), a digital agency (Clickstreamers) 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, 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, 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 would only need to dial Bank on their 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 (OTT) content firm in an all-stock deal valued at Rs 40 crore (around $6 million)