Another David takes on the Goliaths

Financial Express weighs ChatGPT's entry into Indian advertising against the incumbents. OpenAI says 50 brands have shown interest, with WPP and Omnicom as media partners, and ads served to Free and Go users - the majority of its roughly 100 million weekly active users in India.

The piece is honest about the maths working against OpenAI. Meta and Google command more than half of India's digital media spend, and the entry cost filters out most small advertisers: a floor of Rs 725 a day, about Rs 21,750 for a 30-day test, where neither Google nor Meta sets a minimum at all.

Our contribution is the demand-side read: which categories are actually buying. The piece carries our view that interest is strongest from large retailers and ecommerce, D2C beauty and personal care, SaaS and digital products, and larger enterprises with experimental media budgets. On specific advertisers, the article reports - in its own words, not ours - that Mamaearth was first to advertise on ChatGPT in India. None of the brands FE names are described here as Tru Commerce customers.