40 Under 40 2021: Vikash Modi, Wavemaker

Vikash Modi

Chief product officer
Wavemaker
Indonesia

Something of a Wavemaker prodigy, Vikash Modi has spent his entire career at the media agency, working his way up from a management trainee in Mumbai India to chief product officer now based at Wavemaker Indonesia. Over the past 13 years he has worked in multiple roles at the agency, has driven 100s of innovations, and has won more than 150 awards, including two Media Lions at Cannes.

Modi moved to Indonesia in 2019 to start leading digital for Wavemaker Indonesia. Since starting his post, he has consistently worked on building diversified services and growing clientele. In the last two years alone, he has helped Wavemaker digital grow by 205%. To generate this growth, he focussed on three pillars: diversified services, new business and growing existing clients. Modi has successfully led 21 pitches in last two years, with a success rate of 91%. He was instrumental in winning key clients like Loreal, Danone, Perfetti, Bumble, Djarum, Arnott’s and Calbee.

As a leader, it’s fair to say that Modi has come a long way from management trainee in 2008 to chief product officer in early 2021. Over the last 13 years at Wavemaker he has been promoted 10 times. Each time he was challenged with new responsibilities and larger teams, and has delivered excellent results.

With his vision of making Wavemaker the top digital agency in Indonesia, Modi undertook a massive restructuring of the agency and made data science, audience planning, analytics, and precision planning the core of the agency and developed traditional digital services around it. He led from the front and recruited top talent for each vertical to build the expertise for the agency. His ability to lead pitches, drive innovations, win awards, build playbooks, conduct workshops, build tools, and most importantly his ability to enhance his team’s capability, has positively impacted his team members transformation into enviable professionals. He helped grow the digital talent pool from 47 members in 2020 to 66 members in 2021.

Modi is also very passionate about keeping clients and his team ahead in digital maturity. In the past six months he has been futureproofing brands as we move towards a cookieless era.