Video: Dentsu expands digital presence in Southeast Asia

A wholly-owned subsidiary of Dentsu Asia, the company will begin operations tomorrow (1 June) with 16 employees.

The new agency has hired Matt Briant as mobile platform director (formerly with Out There Media), Margery Lynn as social media director (formerly with Dachis Group) and Nick License as strategic planning director (formerly group planning director at Neo@Ogilvy).

Dentsu Mobius will be led by two managing directors: James Hawkins, who is currently executive director of performance marketing at Dentsu Asia, and Angeli T Beltran, who is Dentsu Asia’s executive regional director.

Hawkins joined Dentsu Asia in January last year from dgm Asia, whereby he was the managing director. “Bringing this discipline [performance marketing] to full digital spectrum and applying it to digital creative, production and planning is a key differentiator for Dentsu Mobius,” he told Campaign Asia-Pacific.

The new agency has been formed in response to "increasing demand by the market for a full-service digital agency" and recent digital account wins in Southeast Asia for Dentsu. Among the digital accounts it is holding are The Sands Group and Accor Hotel Group.

An end-to-end digital agency, it is tasked with winning new international business across the Asian territories, he said, adding that the services will include ideation, strategy, creative, production, media and data as well as insights and analysis.

“It will be a performance-based, one-stop shop,” Hawkins said. “We have seen great take-up from the clients who are looking to consolidate their works. They want to be working with one partner only.”

Dentsu Mobius’ digital media department will focus on performance-based search and other related direct response digital services, while the digital solutions department will offer digital production and social, mobile and CRM solutions. It is expected to play a “core role in the group’s digital business in Asia”.