Wondrlab’s proposed acquisition of advertising and media agency Madison World for Rs 1,000 crore has put the spotlight on the martech firm launched in November 2020 by former Publicis Communications India CEO Saurabh Varma and his colleagues Vandana Verma and Rakesh Hinduja. If the acquisition — now in its final stages of discussion — goes through, it will mark the largest buyout of an Indian agency by another domestic player. In an interview with Viveat Susan Pinto, Varma, founder and CEO of Wondrlab, declines to comment on the proposed deal but outlines what he is trying to build with Wondrlab, its acquisition strategy, and future listing plans. Excerpts:
Wondrlab has grown through partnerships and acquisitions. What underpins your confidence in this model?
From day one, our goal was to build a new-age organisation. We chose to create products rather than operate purely as a services layer. When you build robust technology, you can scale much faster. Our model rests on five principles.
First, technology and marketing transformation must be integrated into a single culture — you cannot have two separate operating mindsets. Second, we don’t subscribe to the traditional 100-country agency network model, which made sense only when global clients needed a physical presence in every geography. Today, technology enables consolidation into four or five strategic hubs.
Third, we invested early in building world-class products, which has given us a clear advantage. Fourth, we developed a full-funnel operating and financial framework. And finally, acquisitions are a programmatic part of our growth strategy. In many cases, we use Wondrlab equity as part of the structure, creating a common currency across the ecosystem.
Beyond digital, influencer, and social marketing, what new capabilities are you building?
Traditional full-funnel advertising is already widely practiced — that’s not where differentiation lies. We are more focused on commerce media and building technology that delivers measurable performance outcomes. Anything that enhances our ability to provide meaningful, full-funnel results for clients is of interest — especially tech-led solutions.
You have indicated a roadmap of doing 21 acquisitions in three years. You have completed seven so far. Will it be easy to do three times that number?
That’s broadly the direction, though the number may vary depending on deal size. If we find strong technology companies — even smaller ones — we will pursue them. The focus is on strengthening capabilities, not just adding to the count.
Does this acquisition-led strategy imply an IPO in the near future?
Once we reach the right scale and size, going public makes strategic sense. If acquisitions are programmatic, the most efficient access to capital is through public markets. So yes, from that perspective, an IPO is certainly part of our roadmap — sooner rather than later.
Which markets are core to your expansion plans? What are your billings, team size, and client profile at the moment?
Wondrlab is focusing on India, Poland, and the US. We are already active in the US, which serves as a front-end market for us. Over the next 24 months, our focus will be on strengthening capabilities in India and Poland — both will serve as strategic solution hubs.
While we are not disclosing financial data at this stage, we are around 550–600 people in terms of organisation size. As a technology-driven company, we prioritise platform scalability over headcount growth. We work with over 100 clients, including a significant number of D2C brands, on our commerce platform.