Media plans in seconds: how ITW built an AI planner for sports and entertainment

12 October,2026 03:39 PM IST |  Mumbai  | 

ITW Universe.


In India's high-velocity sports and entertainment market, crafting a cricket media plan or IPL sponsorship plan has traditionally meant weeks of agency coordination, inventory checks and rate revisions. Brand teams often walk into decision meetings with incomplete options and limited cost visibility. That friction is precisely what ITW Universe set out to eliminate with the launch of its AI media-planning consultant, AGI Consultant, on ITWei.com.

The tool accepts a plain-English brief and returns a costed media and sponsorship plan plus partnership shortlist in seconds or minutes. Coverage spans IPL and ICC cricket, JioHotstar advertising and other OTT platforms, fantasy sports, on-ground activations, creator and celebrity partnerships, and entertainment properties including Filmfare, MAMI and Coke Studio. Outputs are grounded in ITW's inventory relationships, delivering realistic pricing ranges that a CMO can take straight into an internal meeting. In a market where timelines compress and rights costs rise, this sports sponsorship plan generator turns the first draft of a plan from a multi-week exercise into an almost immediate output.

"The real bottleneck was never creativity or strategy. It was the waiting," said Bhairav Shanth, Director, ITW Universe. "We built AGI Consultant so a marketer can move from idea to a defensible, costed plan almost immediately. It removes the waiting, not the people. Our own planners use it every day."

The product lives inside the broader ITW Universe ecosystem. Users can begin with an instant plan on ITWei.com and, if required, move into full execution through the same organisation already active across sports, OTT and entertainment inventory. ITW positions the tool as an accelerator for agencies and in-house teams rather than a replacement-an AI media planning India solution built for the realities of the Indian sports-media calendar.

Launch communications are anchored by the short fashion film "Escape Velocity," a dystopian runway piece that closes with the line "Brief. Get the plan." The film is presented as satire about AI-era urgency. The product itself remains a specialised generative-AI planner designed to help marketers and planners move faster when the market will not wait.

A live demo and sample plan outputs are available now at ITWei.com. Marketers, agencies and journalists can submit a brief and receive a shortlist with cost ranges. Early access is also being extended through a Brief Challenge that invites participants to post their own cricket media plans and reactions.

Q&A with Bhairav Shanth, Director, ITW Universe

What does the tool actually replace?

It replaces waiting. Traditional planning cycles for cricket and OTT buys can stretch across weeks of back-and-forth. AGI Consultant compresses the first draft of a costed plan into seconds or minutes so teams can spend their time on judgement, negotiation and creative integration rather than status updates. It does not replace media planners, strategists or agencies. Our own teams use it as a starting point every day.

How are the pricing ranges generated?

The ranges are grounded in ITW's live inventory relationships and historical pricing data across the properties we work with. The system produces realistic bands rather than invented numbers. Final commercial terms are always confirmed at the booking stage. We have built explicit guardrails so the tool does not hallucinate rates or claim inventory it cannot access. That is what separates a genuine sports sponsorship plan generator from a generic chatbot prompt.

What should agencies do with it?

Treat it as an accelerator, not a threat. Agencies can use the tool to give clients a fast, transparent first view of options across IPL, ICC, JioHotstar advertising and entertainment IP, then layer on their strategic insight, negotiation strength and execution capability. Many clients will still want a full-service partner. AGI Consultant simply shortens the distance between brief and informed conversation. Agencies that adopt it early will move faster for their clients without losing the value they already bring.

In a market where IPL, ICC and JioHotstar rights continue to reshape brand calendars, the practical question is no longer whether AI will enter media planning. It is whether the first plan arrives in time to matter. The answer is now live on ITWei.com.

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