Aurora asked Pakistan’s leading advertising agencies to answer three questions:

Here’s what the agency heads had to say:

1 Does AI enhance the creative process? Please explain why and/or why not.

2 Now that AI is seemingly capable of generating an entire process that goes from ideation and artwork to the campaign, how is the concept of originality being redefined?

3 The one AI innovation you are waiting for.

Syed Sajib Abbas

ECD
IAL Saatchi & Saatchi

1 AI enhances creativity in mundane tasks, broadens minds, and empowers a new generation of creatives to think more broadly.

2 Originality lies in human intuition, empathy, and contextual understanding. AI-generated content requires curators, not just creators, to inject soul into machine-driven ideas.

3 An AI innovation that understands a creative’s heart rather than just their brain.

Nazir Ahmed

Senior Manager & Print Head
ZC2 Pakistan

1 AI accelerates the creative process; but the creative thought process of the human brain cannot be matched.

2 AI is capable of providing end-toend campaign solutions. We will, however, have to wait two to three years to see the actual results; only then can AI be judged for originality and trusted as a complete solution provider.

3 It remains to be seen how AI proves itself

Shahnoor Ahmed

Founder & Chief Executive Officer
Spectrum Communications

1 AI speeds up brainstorming, whips out ideas on command, and gets the ball rolling fast. What is missing is that real, human “aha!” moment. AI is useful, not magic.

2 When we mix in more AI, originality will be harder to define. However, the originality will come from the people who sift through it, add the spark, and use their intuition.

3 An AI that integrates analytical depth with creative instincts, enabling adaptive, human-like storytelling capabilities that react to audience feedback.

Nadeem Akbar

Chief Executive Officer
Midas Communications Pakistan

1 AI enhances creativity by providing a supporting role, like automating repetitive tasks, providing insights, helping in research, and allowing creative professionals to focus on strategy and execution.

2 Originality will always come from human creativity; AI-generated campaigns risk becoming monotonous. Originality is the domain of the human mind, but collaboration with AI can help.

3 The ability to create new Pink Floyd music, capturing the band’s essence and emotional depth. In advertising, predicting audience sentiments would be a great help in tailoring ideas.

Gulzar Ali

Managing Director
Adarts

1 AI has brought significant change in the domain of creative advertising. It has the capacity to produce nonpareil copy, graphics, and videos. AI, along with human brainstorming, can generate innovative advertising, enhance the creative process, and make it more efficient.

2 Can AI create original ideas and concepts that resonate with human creativity? It has been established that creativity that combines both AI and humans can have the true essence of originality.

3 An AI capable of generating innovative, engaging, and targeted advertising content in collaboration with creative brains to produce original ideas.

Mehreen Arjumand Almas

Executive Director
Golden Circle

1 Great advertising is a byproduct of insights powered by data mining. Traditional methods of developing creative executions lack scalability and involve human bias. AI is not an industry fad; it is the powerhouse driving the future. It delivers speed, precision, and unmatched scale, predicting effectiveness, allowing for tweaks, and ensuring maximum ROI. Creativity will become personalised, eye-catching, and more likely to win conversion.

2 Originality is a romanticised ideal rather than a reality. AI rejigs existing knowledge rather than perceiving or developing profound sentiment. As of now, the birth of ideas rich in passion and contextual understanding remains a hominoid domain.

3 An AI that can bring end-to-end automation of entire operations. Algorithms will make decisions on how to manage inventory or respond to customer inquiries with minimal human intervention, leading to greater efficiency and the ability to react more quickly to changing customer habits or market conditions.

Ammar Anwer

General Manager
Blitz Advertising

1 AI enhances creativity by accelerating ideation and pattern recognition, aiding exploratory processes. Imaginative creativity, rich with human emotion and context, remains uniquely human and irreplaceable.

2 Unlike AI, which might produce similar outcomes from the same prompts, humans, despite working within defined boundaries, bring diverse ideas and executions. Original creation is a myth. True originality is divine, rooted in God’s work. Humans have always created from inspiration, and guess who created AI?

3 An AI that can handle my day so I can take that annual leave without worrying about who is going to cover me.

Fareshteh Aslam

Chief Executive Officer
Talking Point

1 AI enhances the speed aspect, not so much the creative process. That will always be enhanced by human interaction, especially if it is a locally skewed topic.

2 AI is about what you put in. Long ago, we learned about GIGO; Garbage In, Garbage Out. It’s the same today. If you don’t feed the correct words into ChatGPT, you will struggle. So ultimately, it’s the human that has to be smart enough to extract the best out of the AI that’s vastly available.

3 N/A

Danish Sohail Aziz

Head, Business Development
Message Communications

1 AI enhances the creative process by automating repetitive tasks, allowing creatives to focus on ideation and innovation, boosting efficiency without compromising on originality.

2 Originality is evolving from individual creativity to collaborative processes between humans and AI, where the fusion of machine-generated content and human insight fosters new forms of creativity.

3 An AI tool that understands human emotions and generates content that resonates emotionally, making creative campaigns more impactful.

Mirza Ovais Hassan Ali Baig

Chief Operating Officer
Marksman Advertising

1 AI enhances the creative process by offering new ideas and datadriven insights, helping creators overcome mental blocks, focus on key areas, and provide better work.

2 AI can automate the entire process, but refining it for local markets and audiences is crucial. Creative approaches and insights are still needed to guide AI and refine its outputs.

3 AI that automates influencer marketing by identifying top creators, predicting engagement, and generating personalised content, ultimately fostering authentic brand connections and streamlining the marketing process efficiently.

Latif Amin Bawany

Executive Director
Blaze Group

1 Only if we realise AI’s true potential and usage. It is a tool that adds value to humanly generated concepts, providing inspiration, generating ideas, and helping problem-solving.

2 AI challenges the norms. The ideas generated by AI stem from the prompts written and thought by humans. The direction is always human-led.

3 AI-powered dynamic outdoor media that can adapt content in real-time based on factors like the weather, traffic and current events, ensuring maximum relevance and engagement.

Amna Dadi

ACD
East River International Division

1 AI has transformed my job from a solo pursuit to constant negotiation with an increasingly assertive and opinionated digital collaborator.

2 AI struggles to grasp the nuances of human emotion and the spark of original thought that ignites innovation.

3 AI becomes a visionary co-creator, capable of solutions that not only defy human imagination but can translate my imagination in one go.

Hasan Daudpota

Founder & Owner
Keys Production & PR

1 AI collects pre-existing information and paraphrases it. It lacks the creative process essential to innovation. It effectively presents ideas in a professional format and enhances visual aesthetics.

2 AI bridges imagination and reality, enhancing collaborative design by enabling creators to communicate their vision clearly. It empowers shared creativity, making ideas more accessible and impactful.

3 A tool that gauges audience creativity, develops independent campaigns, calculates ROI, and strengthens connections with audiences and clients, ensuring data-driven marketing strategies.

Aleem Durrani

Founder & Chief Executive Officer
Mediapulse

1 AI offers rapid ideation, providing a diversity of perspectives and bolstering efficiency. Creators can then focus on refining their vision.

2 AI challenges originality, but those who actively use it know that it is limited to remixing, refining, and curating as opposed to genuine invention. I have yet to come across AI that has accomplished original thought.

3 An AI that can understand human emotions and context.

Natasha Durrani

COO
Media Matters Communications

1 AI can assist in repetitive tasks, but creativity stems from human emotion, intuition, and cultural understanding. It enhances efficiency, but creativity remains a uniquely human skill.

2 Originality blends human insight with AI’s efficiency. While AI generates ideas, human creativity adds depth, cultural context, and emotional connections.

3 An AI that localises content, capturing cultural nuances and linguistic subtleties, ensuring that brands can connect with diverse audiences across regions.

Raza Faisal

Chief Executive Officer
Team Reactive

1 Used smartly, AI can save time and help with visualisation. AI improves productivity by generating visuals once impossible to see unless sketched. It gives added creative muscle to imagine the unimaginable. If used consistently, machine learning can adapt to individual preferences, creative nuances, brand requirements, and personas.

2 AI can aid originality. Creatives can now put their thoughts into words and generate concepts that are inherently their own as opposed to finding ‘the closest match or reference.’ Prompting will become an art. This is subjective and dependent on the context in which AI is used.

3 AI-powered task management systems to improve agency supplychain systems and reduce burnout.

Shaheryar Ghayas

Founder & CCO
Madnest and CCO, RevX

1 AI offers a vast reservoir of creative minds across time and disciplines, exponentially elevating the creative process.

2 True originality stems from human emotion, risk, and connection. AI can mimic storytelling and nuance, but it doesn’t experience life as we do. Creativity’s soul remains human-driven and deeply insightful.

3 Seamless brain-computer interfaces integrating AI with human minds – like Neo downloading knowledge in the Matrix, enhancing cognition and creating a new breed of intelligence.

Syed Amir Haleem

Chief Executive Officer
Skale Interactive

1 AI enhances creativity by automating repetitive tasks and generating ideas quickly. My team uses AI to find new ways to express their visualisation, find inspiration for ideation, and explore creative possibilities.

2 AI is a great illustration tool. It is driven by the prompt. The essence of originality of human thought is still preserved in how the idea is expressed in the prompt. The same AI tool can produce useless creative visuals depending on the prompt.

3 Analyse online data to predict consumer behaviour with an insane level of accuracy.

Faraz Maqsood Hamidi

Founder & CCO
The D’Hamidi Partnership

1 Just as search engines deepened insights and Photoshop replaced X-acto knives, AI accelerates prototyping and idea generation, enabling creatives to streamline workflows and bring concepts to life.

2 Originality shifts from creation to curation, defined by how creatives filter, refine, and infuse their brand-led insights into AI-generated outputs, blending human creativity with machine-driven meta-versatility.

3 A tool that compels marketers to provide actionable feedback – because, ultimately, our intelligence is not ‘artificial’.

Syed Jawaid Iqbal

President & Chief Executive Officer
CMC

1 AI enhances the creative process by providing ideas, speeding up workflows, and assisting with tasks like research or content creation, allowing creatives to focus on executing innovative concepts.

2 AI redefines originality by merging human creativity with algorithmic capabilities, producing data-driven results that challenge traditional notions of original thought. It helps the creative process by offering a fresh approach to ideation and execution.

3 Advanced real-time campaign optimisation, where AI continuously adjusts campaigns based on performance insights, enhancing effectiveness throughout the campaign lifecycle.

Seema Jaffer

Chief Executive Officer
Bond Advertising

1 AI allows creators to push boundaries. AI is an essential collaborator in art, music, and communication. The technical prowess that AI brings opens doors to endless possibilities.

2 Human emotions, the human experience, and human empathy are irreplaceable. Depending solely on AI will stunt the limits of what human imagination can achieve.

3 When AI stops mimicking the biases in the real world and helps solve issues related to poverty, injustice, climate crisis, and builds a more equitable and peaceful world.

Khurram Jaffrani

Chief Executive Officer
Adpulse E IMC

1 AI boosts creativity by automating tasks, analysing data, and suggesting new ideas, liberating humans to focus on high-level thinking and innovative problem solving.

2 Originality combines human insight, emotion, and experience with AI’s speed, scalability, and precision, redefining what it means to be creative.

3 AI innovations that understand human emotions, values, and context, enabling more empathetic, personalised, and culturally relevant content creation and storytelling.

Omar Jamil

Chief Executive Officer
Latitude CRS

1 AI is as effective as the person wielding it. AI can enhance the creative process by supporting the creator. Depending on the format, this can be as simple as giving ideas to help the brainstorming process or as advanced as creating entire content based on a prompt. While the former serves to enhance the creative process, the latter limits it by putting too much dependency on the AI.

2 AI cannot create original content without a prompt or input from a human operator. That said, in time AI will become capable of creating entirely original work; once this happens, then we will need to redefine the concept of originality.

3 An AI that can take over my job.

Ahmed Kapadia

Chairman & CEO
Synergy Group

1 AI only enhances the creative process when employed as a tool to augment human imagination. It streamlines execution, but creativity only thrives when this technology complements original human insight and direction. We work the tools, not the other way round.

2 AI can automate processes from ideation to execution. However, originality relies on human ingenuity. AI lacks the ability to generate culturally relevant concepts born of human experiences. It has the ability to think, not to feel.

3 An AI that can personalise advertising campaigns on an emotional level, with the ability to ‘feel’ the idea – not just generate ideas based on datasets it has been fed.

Umair Kazi

Partner
Ishtehari

1 If creativity is defined as the convergence of multiple ideas, yes. AI can create these combinations on scale. The hard part is curation.

2 Just because it has been thought of does not mean it has been done. Originality will still exist in executions. The onus will be on brands to greenlight originality faster.

3 An AI that can ‘collect’ fragments across the internet in order to have a detailed understanding of campaigns executed and can point out specifics of what worked versus what didn’t.

Adeeba Mahmood Khan

CCO
Manhattan Communications

1 By taking on the mechanical function of analysing data, serving as a brainstorming partner to a technical assistant, freeing the creator’s time to focus on the imaginative aspects.

2 AI’s originality is restricted given its nature of re-mixing materials from existing data patterns. This redefines the creative process by leveraging insightful prompts to combine human intuition with machine-generated content.

3 ‘Contextual understanding’ that grasps nuances, emotion, and cultural context, giving AI the ability to ‘think creatively’ beyond pattern recognition and data analysis.

Azam Jalal Khan

Co-Founder & CEO
Digitz Group

1 We are experiencing a lift in our creative process from thought starters to final design execution with AI. There has been an increase in efficiency and output.

2 Although human creativity is not matched by AI yet, it is redefining originality by enabling creative thinking to go beyond conventional boundaries.

3 It is already here. To build and programme better tech and software products that continue to improve on the base.

Fawad Khan

Co-Founder & COO
XO-5

1 AI supports but does not enhance creativity. The creative process demands human intuition, emotional resonance, and originality. AI can assist, but the human elements are still irreplaceable.

2 Originality is defined by how well humans guide AI tools. Originality comes from human insight, perspective, and the ability to emotionally connect with audiences.

3 An AI that understands and integrates human emotional depth, enabling collaboration whereby machines grasp nuance, empathy, and context to co-create with human imagination.

Hassan Reyaz Khan

Co-CEO
Echo Digital

1 Enhances the creative process by accelerating workflow and reducing time to output. It optimises efficiency when used intelligently.

2 Originality is a blend of inspirations. While AI can generate content, creativity requires human input. AI depends on prompts, and human intervention remains essential.

3 AI-powered robots that can clean and restore the environment, helping make the world a healthier place.

Saher A. Khan

CEO
Ruth & Alison, Pakistan

1 AI enriches the creative journey by expanding ideation and refining execution. True creativity is human-led, with AI enhancing it. To illustrate my point, I asked AI to answer one of these questions. Can you identify which one?

2 Originality emerges from the synergy created when human intuition meets AI’s precision. It is a redefined ‘new,’ where ideas fuse with AI’s adaptive, solution-driven capabilities.

3 An AI that has brand identity at its core. Evolving ideas like a strategist, integrating more than data but the nuanced essence of what a brand represents.

Aamir Khwaja

COO
MullenLowe Rauf

1 AI enhances efficiency by providing the tools to create and bring ideas to life. AI also takes away the essential emotional and human connection to the assets that we create.

2 So far, human thinking is superseding AI execution when it comes to originality. AI makes it easier to articulate an idea; it doesn’t have the ability to come up with something new.

3 Demystifying the ever-complex target groups or providing specific insights from specific markets.

Emen Iftikhar Kiani

ECD
Conglo

1 AI enhances the creative process by offering diverse perspectives. Automation allows creatives to focus on refining ideas. Human intuition remains essential for authenticity and emotion.

2 Originality means mixing AI efficiency with human creativity, where newness comes from combining ideas in unique ways rather than creating something entirely from scratch.

3AI that can predict trends more accurately and help creatives stay ahead in terms of emerging ideas and styles, while still leaving room for unique, human-driven inspiration.

Mohammed Zubair Mallick

Managing Director
Lotus Client Management & PR

1 AI has changed the creative landscape and introduced new challenges. While it can generate ideas and assist in tasks like content creation, it lacks the depth of understanding and emotional connection humans bring to creative work. Because it is so easy to use AI to generate ideas, it has made communicators complacent when it comes to strategic thinking and writing. AI can be valuable when used strategically. It can help brainstorm ideas, analyse data, and identify trends. It is crucial to maintain a human touch throughout the process to resonate with audiences.

2 Originality has evolved, taking on new meaning with each generation and every technological advancement. While AI can generate unique ideation and content, it lacks the authentic storytelling that resonates with people.

3 Tools that can intuitively interpret cultural nuances and emotional contexts.

Zameer Qureshi

Group CEO
Nativ Global

1 AI accelerates the digital ecosystem by generating innovative ideas and providing data-driven insights, enabling creatives to dedicate more time to concept development.

2 The new normal has become a fusion of human ingenuity and AI-generated ideas. This collaborative creativity is pioneering inventive strategies and radical innovations previously unimagined.

3 Voice-activated consumer shopping, enabling product searches, personalised recommendations, and streamlined transactions through voice commands.

Shoaib Qureshy

Managing Director
Bullseye DDB

1 AI is as good as the person using it, as it is human input dependent. It enhances the creative process by adding creative value and saving time.

2 Your mindset matters. AI is your creative assistant. You can create whatever you imagine, inspire, and influence AI.

3 AI bringing more humanity, justice, and peace to this world.

Shahnaz Ramzi

CEO
Starlinks PR

1 AI enhances the creative process by automating mundane tasks, analysing data, and generating ideas. But human intuition, local context, and emotional intelligence are essential for innovative and relevant storytelling. AI generates great options, but I don’t think it can deliver a compelling story without any creative human input.

2 Originality is walking a tightrope, as it balances AI-driven efficiency and ideation with human creativity. Although AI-generated ideas cannot be termed original, when fused with human judgment and emotional connection, one can come up with an authentic, winning product. The concept of originality is being redefined, making it more collaborative and hybrid.

3 An AI-powered data compilation of all PR work done for clients. Would save so much time and be much more efficient than our current system of compilation.

Sabene Saigol

Chief Executive Officer
RED PUBLICIS

1 We are on the fence. Although AI streamlines repetitive tasks, freeing up time, it can compromise the depth and authenticity of the final creative output.

2 AI can assist, but originality is challenged. It often repurposes ideas, lacking the empathy and storytelling unique to human creativity.

3 An AI tool that crafts clear, data-driven briefs capturing performance metrics, and pinpointing challenges for more targeted, impactful strategies.

Humera Saleem

Chief Executive Officer
Zebra Issue

1 If I can get ChatGPT to conduct research, proofread, and refine my proposals, I have more time to focus on thinking about incubating work. I now have an assistant who gets me, is trainable, and delivers on time, so I can focus on what I do best.

2 AI is democratising the business and allowing anyone to create, with or without the designation, the Mac, and the suites. This will lead to the unearthing of untapped talent in organisations.

3 Do my laundry, clean my house, and fuel my car.

Khalid Saleem

Chief Executive Officer
RG Blue Communications

1 AI enhances the creative process by offering innovative ideas, streamlining workflows, and providing data-driven insights, allowing creators to focus on concepts and refine their vision.

2 AI-generated content enhances creativity, but it still requires team brainstorming that combines human intuition with machine assistance to produce results.

3 An AI innovation that can analyse cultural trends and predict future creative directions, empowering marketers with data-driven insights to stay ahead of the curve.

Naveed Seraj

Founder & CCO
Viral Edge

1 AI enhances creativity by offering foresight into outcomes, allowing creators to visualise and refine storyboards – transforming imaginative ideas into brand-aligned results.

2 AI’s role in generating ideas, artwork, and campaigns redefines originality as a collaborative process. Rather than replacing human creativity, AI becomes a cocreator, drawing from vast data to inspire new ideas and enhance creative executions. Originality means blending AI’s adaptive insights with human vision, intuition, and emotional intelligence to produce outcomes that are influenced by technology yet deeply human. The synergy between AI and human creativity fosters innovation.

3 An AI that enables high-quality video execution.

Abdul Qadir Shah

Chief Executive Officer
Connect Marketing Communications

1 AI is useful to begin with, but it depends on how far we want to go with it. It can hinder the creative process if we solely depend on it.

2 AI can provide a framework, but creative ideas, expressions, and differentiation created within the framework is what makes it original.

3 We can work on many things, including research and coming up with extraordinary solutions.

Fizza Shah

ECD
Grey Pakistan

1 Creativity is a process, and we have been using multiple tools and methods to assist in this process. AI is one of those tools, one that enables creatives to jumpstart the process – offering them ideas they can build on.

2 I don’t think AI challenges originality. AI blends human ideas with machine-generated content, which leads to improved original ideas.

3 AI innovations that improve emotional intelligence, allowing machines to better understand and respond to human emotions.

Sajid Shamim

CEO
Repcom Advertising

1 AI enhances creativity by generating ideas, saving time, offering data-driven insights, and enabling personalisation. It acts as a collaborative tool, pushing creators to explore new paths. Over-reliance can lead to formulaic outputs, and AI lacks the emotional depth and originality inherent to human-driven creativity. Balance is essential.

2 AI’s role from ideation to execution blurs traditional notions of originality as it generates content based on patterns, data, and algorithms. Originality is being redefined as a blend of human creativity and AI-assisted innovation, where unique ideas emerge from collaborations between machine-driven insights and human interpretation.

3 An AI innovation that is intuitive, emotionally intelligent, and blends complex human emotions, offering empathy and creativity, while maintaining originality, cultural sensitivity, and artistic integrity across different media.

Zohare Ali Shariff

Chief Executive Officer
Asiatic Public Relations

1 AI enhances the creative process by providing datadriven insights and improving efficiency. True creativity must be based on original thought, and not the thoughts of others reprocessed by AI.

2 AI’s capabilities may greatly improve ideation and efficiency, but AI-generated processes can be repetitive and generic. Originality still requires human emotional intelligence and storytelling.

3 The ultimate personal executive secretary. One with knowledge of everything, the ability to imitate human intelligence, and possessed of excellent communication and problem-solving skills.

Asim Khan Sikandar

Sr Executive Director
Midas

1 AI enhances the creative process. Creativity is a product of a multitude of observations, experiences, and insights. AI curates data from countless sources to come up with variations of something already done before. This is creativity, even if inspired by secondary sources. What AI does even better is support the creative process by getting rid of the repetitive tasks involved in the creative process.

2 Human invention is a step-by-step process where one step cannot happen before the preceding logical one. There could not be bulbs without first having electricity. AI has a lot of ground to cover in terms of human emotion, and human creativity will have an edge over AI for the foreseeable future, just like handicrafts have an edge over machine-made things.

3 Where human consciousness can be transferred into indestructible data and transported across the universe to new planets, where the same consciousness can be turned again into human form to experience undiscovered worlds.

Atiya Zaidi

CEO & CCO
BBDO Pakistan

1 Abstract ideas can live and breathe outside a creative’s mind. Ridiculous creativity is now possible, which was a dream before. You don’t need to waste time thinking of mundane tasks and finally have the time for deep thinking, which every creative seldom had before AI.

2 AI can curate, not create. But it is a great way to get the first thoughts out of the way. As we know, those first thoughts are mostly wrong and done before. AI is a good test to see where the distinction can come in the first step of the creative process and not the final product. Edit, prune, and perfect after AI has done its work.

3 Teach us better ways of handling humans.