A recent entrant has been that of its president Mahesh Chauhan. He says, "My mandate at Everest is very clear - make Everest an agency to reckon with. My single point programme to fulfill that mandate was to embark on a process of creating a team at Everest, which would offer the widest possible range of expertise in order to add value to existing businesses and acquire new businesses.

"While the process of strengthening Team Everest will be continuous, and we are looking at several new appointments in the near future, I believe we have today the nucleus of an agency which will be able to compete and win against all opposition."

Among the significant additions to the company is Sourabh Mishra who joins as national planning director. Mishra moved from O&M where he was one of the key planning resources. He has worked with clients like Coca Cola, Cadbury's, HLL, ITC Foods, Himalaya, Dabur, Parle, NIIT and Titan.

Strengthening the planning team further is Amit Kekre who joins as planning director, Mumbai. Kekre has worked with leading agencies including O&M, Lowe and JWT and on leading brands such as HLL, Marico, Standard Chartered, Tata Motors and BP-Castrol.

Everest's Mumbai office has also seen the entry of Vijay Lalwani as associate creative director. Joining from O&M, Lalwani's work was amongst the finalists at Cannes this year. His recent work includes Hutch, Sprite, Cadbury and Parle among others. Anant Pal Singh has moved in as an account director from Rediffusion DYR. Singh has in the past worked on brands like BP-Castrol and Airtel.

Meanwhile the company's Delhi office has been strengthened with the appointment of Rajeev Rakshit as VP and office head. Rakshit joined Everest from Publicis and is regarded as an instrumental member of the team behind the emergence of Publicis. Prior to Publicis, Rakshit was a key member of the team leading Euro RSCG in Bangalore during the agency's turnaround and heydays during the late 90s.

He brings in significant expertise in the technology arena acquired over the years working on brands like Intel, HP-Compaq, Nokia, Microsoft and Motorola in both national and regional roles. Joining Rakshit at Everest Delhi is Manisha Sethi as associate creative director. Sethi moves from Cheil where she was working on Samsung.

Chauhan added, "The reality is that Everest had good people on board but the addition of certain key ingredients was essential for the complete product to be a synergistic whole. The track records of the new appointments speak for themselves and provide completeness to the Everest offering. To sum it all up, as they say, we have managed to put together 'A Few Good Men (and Women!)' and the next step for us is to acquire 'A Few (or lots of) Good Businesses'!"