Punitha Arumugam exits Google India

By Pritha Dasgupta
MUMBAI: Punitha Arumugam, director -agency business at Google India, has put in her papers. A media agency veteran who worked with Madison Media for over 13 years, Arumugam joined the internet giant in 2012 with a mandate to create an agency ecosystem for Google India to work with.

"Google has been an amazing company to work for and a great learning trajectory for me personally and professionally. Am on a long planned break as of now from Dec 1st and will decide next steps after the break," she told ET. A Google India spokesperson said the process of replacing Arumugam is still underway."Punitha has been a tremendous leader and has contributed enormously to Google India's growth and recognition in the agency ecosystem. We wish her every success in her future endeavour," the spokesperson said.

Arumugam said she will stay with Google till the end of November. She declined to comment on the reason behind her exit and her future plans. "I always nurtured the dream of setting up a media agency of the future," she said.

A person close to the development said Arumugam might join back the advertising industry. She also has an offer from a publishing house, the person said.

She worked with Ogilvy & Mather and Lintas before joining Madison in January 1999 as media services director.

She quickly moved up the ranks to become COO in 2001 and CEO of Madison Media West in 2003.

At Madison, she handled clients like Kinetic, the Essel Group, P&G, Godrej and BPL.