For Ogilvy, Cannes Lions 2026 has been another year of global dominance. The network was crowned Network of the Year across Asia-Pacific, Latin America and North America, reinforcing its position as one of the world's strongest creative forces. Yet for India, the mood has been more mixed. While the country has once again produced work that earned global recognition, the overall medal tally has prompted questions about whether India is losing momentum on advertising's biggest stage.
Speaking to Neeta Nair, Editor, IMPACT Magazine, at Cannes Lions 2026, Liz Taylor, Global Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy, and Kainaz Karmakar, Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy India who was also the Jury President in the Health and Wellness category this year, pushed back against that narrative. For them, India's challenge isn't a shortage of creativity. If anything, the country continues to produce some of the world's most relevant work. The bigger challenge, they argued, lies in creating work that is deeply rooted in genuine client problems, telling those stories effectively and continuing to innovate without losing sight of business relevance.
Watch the full conversation here:
Taylor was quick to dismiss the suggestion that India had taken a backseat this year. "I would not say that," she said. "We are beating the drum from every region. There's incredible work on our biggest brands." For her, India's presence extended beyond the medal count. She pointed to the historic appointment of India's first female Cannes Lions Jury President as another defining moment for the country. "The work is spectacular and we all feel Piyush's spirit is with us. I do not feel like India has taken a backseat," Taylor expressed.
Karmakar, however, acknowledged that India's performance felt ‘bittersweet.’ "We missed the gold. There is no running away from that," she admitted. But she was equally quick to point out that the country's successes deserved celebration too. For example, Colgate India's first-ever Cannes Lion came through 'Indianis Dentris', a campaign that not only won a Silver Lion but also gave the brand confidence to push creative boundaries further. "Yesterday, we had a workshop with them and they were thrilled about it. They are really excited to do more work like that," she said.
She also pointed to 'Renu vs The City' for St. Jude India ChildCare Centres, a campaign that continued the organisation's impressive Cannes run after last year's success in the Writing category. "It's made on such a small budget. The work has made a true difference in India and it's winning at Cannes."
For Taylor, however, Cannes has never been the benchmark by which Ogilvy judges its work. "Cannes is never the goal for us," she said. "It's always a happy outcome." The real measure of success, she argued, is whether the agency is consistently producing outstanding work for its biggest clients in its biggest markets. "If we do that, Cannes becomes the icing on the cake," she adds.
The conversation then turned to a question that often surfaces after every Cannes Lions festival: do certain countries have an advantage because they are associated with particular social or cultural issues? Should Indian agencies continue tackling large-scale societal challenges because that's what global juries expect? Or should they pursue smaller, more universal consumer problems in the way many Western campaigns do?
Taylor rejected the premise altogether. For her, winning work never begins with a country's image. It begins with the brand. "At the end of the day, the key is the best insights that really connect the brand to the consumer," she said. While cultural context certainly plays a role, she argued that campaigns should never attempt to address issues that have no relevance to the brand simply because they appear award-worthy. For her, every campaign must begin with a genuine business challenge and a consumer insight that naturally belongs to the brand.
She illustrated the point with two examples. Heinz's campaign solving the simple frustration of where people place ketchup while eating fries—emerged from an everyday human behaviour. On the other hand, Dove's work around hair discrimination laws in the United States addressed a social issue, but one that naturally aligned with the brand's long-standing platform around real beauty. In both cases, she argued, the campaigns remained rooted in the client's purpose and business objectives rather than chasing an issue for the sake of awards.
Karmakar also believes India's strongest work follows exactly the same principle. She pointed to Indianis Dentris, as ‘a fresh brief.’ The campaign addressed everyday Indian behaviour. "I don't see any other campaign tackling the fact that people in India do not throw away their toothbrushes till it gets really old and almost flowers," she said.
At the other end of the spectrum sat Renu vs The City, a campaign built around the struggles faced by cancer patients and their families who travel to Mumbai for treatment. The insight was completely different, but equally authentic, “How do they fight the city? There is no place to stay. It's a very expensive city."
The conversation naturally flowed into another topic dominating discussions across the Croisette this year: WPP Creative. Following WPP's move to bring its creative agencies closer together, questions have continued around what brands like Ogilvy and VML can or cannot do like the other. Taylor was careful to draw a distinction. "It's not integration," she clarified. According to her, the restructuring is largely about making collaboration easier behind the scenes rather than merging agency identities. "We're still keeping both op-cos as separate—VML and Ogilvy."
Instead, WPP Creative is designed to make it easier for agencies to share specialist capabilities where clients need them. Commerce, for instance, currently sits within VML, while Ogilvy leads broader brand-building work. On global accounts such as SEJ, those capabilities already work together as one team. "The client might not know to their face who's Ogilvy and who's VML. That's the purpose of it—to make it easier for clients."
Just as importantly, Taylor wanted to dispel concerns that agency brands would eventually disappear. "We're not getting rid of the brands. We're not changing anything." Instead, she described a culture where agencies increasingly root for one another rather than compete internally. "We all win when we all win," she expressed.
Karmakar echoed that sentiment from an Indian perspective. While Ogilvy and VML remain separate brands, she said collaboration between leaders like Kalpesh Patankar and Babita Baruah has become completely natural whenever clients require integrated teams. Colgate is one such example, where different parts of the business sit with different agencies but come together around the same client. She also praised VML India's recent work, particularly KitKat's slowest Vending Machine and Kolhapuri, that didn’t convert to a metal in Cannes Lions 2026 but called them ‘absolutely brilliant pieces of work.’ For her, WPP Creative isn't changing the identity of agencies. It's making it easier for the best ideas and capabilities to come together around clients.
While agencies are increasingly working in integrated teams, Taylor doesn't believe clients have changed as much. Many still split mandates across creative, media, commerce and production, but she says that's nothing new. "That's been happening in the RFP process forever." Rather than waiting for clients to change, Ogilvy chooses to show up differently. Every brief is approached with integrated, culture-first thinking, regardless of how the client has divided the work. That also means collaborating not just across WPP agencies, but with competing networks when required. "We're still good partners to our competitors because, at the end of the day, our clients have to do well," she said.
For Taylor, agencies shouldn't simply respond to briefs with individual deliverables. "We'll never show up as just an agency that would bring them just a film," she said. "We need to solve a big business problem. You need all of the parts of the funnel to make that happen."
Beyond agency structures, Karmakar as the Jury President in the Health and Wellness category also walked away from Cannes with something equally valuable: a clearer understanding of what separates shortlisted work from winning work. Having spent days inside the jury room, she said the experience has already changed the way she will approach future case studies.
The first lesson was the importance of making cultural context impossible to miss. "If you are coming from a deep cultural truth, then you have to make that cultural truth extremely clear in your case study." For campaigns rooted in local behaviours or traditions, agencies cannot assume an international jury will instinctively understand why something matters. Long before a jury convenes, entries pass through the shortlist stage, where creators aren't present to explain their thinking. Unless the cultural context is immediately apparent, an otherwise strong idea risks losing momentum before it even reaches the room.
The second lesson, she said, was craft. "It's not just for case studies, but for case studies as well, craft makes a difference." How an idea is presented like the pacing, music, editing, supers and storytelling can dramatically influence how jurors experience the work. She pointed to Kotex's ‘Art's Missing Period’, one of this year's standout entries, as an example of how every element of a case film worked in harmony. Finally, Karmakar stressed that credibility has become non-negotiable, "You have to be bulletproof."
That lesson became especially clear in the Health & Wellness jury room, where claims were routinely questioned and evidence closely examined. With medical professionals and subject experts sitting alongside creative leaders, campaigns were expected to substantiate every statistic, scientific claim and business result they presented. Whenever those findings failed to support what appeared in the case study, the work inevitably suffered. "If you're putting results in the case study, do not assume that the jury will take your word for it," she specified.
Reflecting on her return to Ogilvy, Taylor said what sets the network apart is its culture of trust and collaboration. Whether she was joining, leaving or returning, she was treated with the same respect, while a global culture of sharing ideas rather than competing created an environment where she ‘felt safe’ to thrive, ultimately drawing her back to the agency. .
The interview concluded with a discussion on innovation and India's changing role in driving it. Karmakar argued that India is no longer waiting for ideas to arrive from the West, pointing to Shah Rukh Khan-My-Ad as an early example of machine learning and personalisation at scale, Garuda Rakshak as proof of India's innovation capabilities, and Savlon Chalks as a reminder that innovation isn't always high-tech. More recently, Guardian Beads (Number Rakshak) continued that philosophy by using a simple idea to help reunite lost people with their families. "It truly changed the way people can be lost and found," she said, adding that these campaigns show India is "right there" when it comes to shaping the future of creative innovation.
The conversation ultimately pointed to a shift that extends beyond this year's Cannes results. Whether discussing award-winning work, jury expectations or innovation, both Taylor and Karmakar kept returning to the same principle: the strongest campaigns don't begin with what might win a Lion. They begin with a problem the brand has every right to solve. Everything else, including the awards, comes later.
