Move and win roundup: Week of January 17, 2022

Ad marketplace Index Exchange announced expansion plans into Singapore with the appointment of Yogesh Sehgal as APAC platform partnerships director. As the first employee based in Singapore, Sehgal, formerly APAC head of partner development with Magnite, will be tasked with expanding the company’s demand footprint across the region and strengthening regional DSP partnerships. He has 14 years of digital advertising experience driving revenue, strategic partnerships and regional strategy across connected TV (CTV) publishers, platforms and adtech companies. Prior to Magnite, where he spent three and a half years, he was with Rubicon Project for four years and Times Internet for six and a half years.

FCB Malaysia announced a series of creative appointments. The agency:

• Promoted Wang Ie Tjer, to head of creative. He was previously creative director and has been a member of the agency’s senior team since 2018. He will lead a team of 30 creatives.
• Promoted Jonathan Chan and James Voon to associate creative director for copywriting and art direction, respectively. They were previously creative group heads.
• Promoted Megan Ong and Wong Ching Sin to senior copywriters and Ahmad Hafidz to senior art director.
• Hired Suah Boon Chuan, formerly of Dentsu and TBWA, as associate creative director.
• Hired Amin Taib as senior AV producer, Lim Poh Yeng as senior art director, Muhammad Fadhli as senior graphic designer, and Tan Lai Kuen and Muhammad Syamim as graphic designers.

Malaysia's Go Communications announced a series of personnel moves:

• Sheree Qua will join founder and CEO Peter de Kretser in leading the agency as general manager and chief financial officer.
• The agency promoted Choulyin Tan to communications director, client services director-at-large.
• Zalfian Fuzi joins the core leadership as communications director, business development.
• Lim Huei Yuih, who began her career at Go as an intern seven years ago, is promoted to brand director and will lead her own client-services team.
• Laura Kang has been named digital director,
• Art director Leonard Lee joins the leadership team.
• Chief editor Sanjay Jacob will helm the agency’s editorial team.
• Tham Yin Ling is promoted to senior finance and administration manager.

Omar Sotomayor has joined Edelman Singapore as its new executive creative director. He brings over 17 years of experience to this role, having worked at Leo Burnett in Chicago and BBH in Singapore for clients including McDonald’s, Kellogg’s, P&G, Nike and Ikea. In his new role, Sotomayor reports to APAC chief creative officer Tim Green.

MediaCom names a new APAC CEO. [Full story here.]

Media agency M/Six has appointed Jess Burley to take on the role of global executive and Jack Swayne, previously CEO for EMEA, joins the global board to lead the day-to-day running of the agency globally. The agency also picked up a series of new clients including Discovery, Jabra and CBRE globally, Whirlpool, Ocado and National Express in EMEA, PUMA in APAC and Plenity in North America. 

B2B marketing agency Just Global has promoted Jevic Batalon to senior account director in its Singapore office. Batalon joined the company in 2020 and secured six clients last year. Meanwhile, Arjun Ghosh joins digital marketing director where he will drive media planning across brand and demand programmes. Ghosh has spent a majority of his career with global agencies MediaCom and Mindshare on accounts such as Unilever, Nestle, GSK, Pepsico, Gillette, Motorola and BP. Finally, Joy Tang joins the APAC team as senior copywriter. She brings experience in content development from past tenures at April Six, Cohn & Wolfe, and Hill+Knowlton Strategies.  

Indian agency Chimp&z Inc has bagged the digital marketing mandate for MuscleXP, a sports supplement brand, and Man Arden, a male grooming and skincare brand. The agency will be responsible for amplifying the brands’ social media communications across Facebook & Instagram as well as craft social media strategies and campaigns.

Snap has appointed Gareth Leeding as its head of creative strategy in APAC and Haran Ramachandran to the same role in Australia & New Zealand. Leeding was most recently executive creative director at We Are Social’s UK office where he built a creative department and co-founded WAS Sport. Ramachandran has also relocated from London where he was most recently the creative lead for Three Mobile and PR agency The Academy.

Adobe appointed Simon Dale as managing director of Adobe Korea, in addition to his role leading Adobe Southeast Asia (SEA), which he has held since 2019. He will drive Adobe’s Korea and SEA businesses across Adobe Experience Cloud, Adobe Creative Cloud and Adobe Document Cloud, reporting to Simon Tate, president of Adobe Asia Pacific.

Hoang Nguyen, former director of digital and engineering at Appscore and executive director of engineering at CHE Proximity, joined Howatson and Company as chief data and technology officer. Hoang has led teams and designed architectures for blue-chip enterprises such as NAB and ANZ, Samsung, Telstra, and many financial and technology startups.

OOH Capital, a global out-of-home advisory company and consultancy, named Jim Liu as partner in Asia. Liu was formerly head of OOH in China with Zenith and later helped set up GroupM’s Kinetic China. The company advises OOH businesses, cities, real-estate owners and technology suppliers on the best ways to navigate the rapidly changing OOH landscape.

Shikha Kapur, Amit Chandrra and Prabhat Choudhary launched Andaz, described as an integrated marketing solutions company in India. Kapur is former CMO of Fox Star Studios, UTV Disney and former COO of ErosSTX. Chandrra was previously managing director of Trigger Happy Entertainment Network. Choudhary is the founder of Spice PR and Entropy Digital. Collectively, the three have worked on four out of the five top-grossing films of all time in India. They claim the company will conceive and implement innovative marketing solutions that challenge conventional models and enable deeper conversations with audiences.

Omnicom Media Group (OMG) has made two two senior appointments in Malaysia. Kiron Kesav has been promoted from general manager of PHD Malaysia to chief strategy officer of OMG Malaysia. Mayank Bhatnagar has been appointed as managing director of OMD Malaysia. He previously led Malaysia’s biggest advertiser Nestle, as well as headed digital trading and investment across Mindshare Malaysia. 

Hivestack, a programmatic digital out of home (DOOH) ad tech company has launched its operations in Malaysia and appointed Pearly Teong as VP, demand, Malaysia & Thailand. Teong joins the business from Amobee. As part of the expansion into Malaysia, Hivestack has also signed OOH/DOOH media owners via the Hivestack Supply Side Platform (SSP), including BIG Tree, Seni Jaya and Spectrum, who will be able to monetise their premium DOOH inventory by connecting to a worldwide pool of advertisers in real-time.

Following a competitive multi-agency pitch, The Mavericks India, a reputation management advisory firm, has won the national communications mandate for Hero Lectro E-Cycles. As part of the engagement, The Mavericks will work with Hero Lectro to drive specific narratives around the category as well as the brand through strategic marketing and communication campaigns. 

Independent creative PR agency Forward has announced four new clients including:  

• Magnum Ice Cream: following the launch of the Magnum 'Destinations' range, Forward is working with the brand to define and activate its purpose in Australia.
• Forward will re-launch Dove's brand purpose in Australia through an integrated influencer, earned and social campaign.
• The agency will also relaunch Oliver's Real Food in Australia. 
• Snack Brands Australia: Forward has been appointed by the makers of CC’s Cheezels and Kettle Chips to launch a new product in 2022 with a campaign to create social and earned media buzz and sales.

The Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) has appointed Hill+Knowlton Strategies (H+K) as its communications agency of record in India following a competitive pitch. The agency will be responsible for developing and implementing an integrated communication strategy for the ‘Commercialization of Biofortified Crops’ programme to promote biofortified food products—zinc wheat and iron pearl millet—and improve its awareness among key stakeholders in India’s regional markets. 

Havas Group China has appointed Cary Huang, formerly CEO of Publicis Media China, as executive vice president and chief operation officer of Havas Media Group China. He will report to Karl Wu, chairman and CEO of Havas Group Greater China, and will be a member of the Havas Global Super 9 Committee. Based in Shanghai, Huang will oversee the team and operations, including client relations management and capturing new business opportunities. Earlier in his career Huang has served as CEO of IPG Mediabrands China and as CEO of Kinetic and GroupM's OOH unit.  

Clemenger BBDO Sydney has hired Brent Kerby as its new CEO, after Pete Bosilkovski was revealed to be departing the agency in November 2021. Kerby moves over from a six-year stint with Dentsu, most recently as MD of Creative in Sydney, responsible for BWM Isobar and DentsuMB. He begins his new role in February.

Coinciding with Kerby's departure, Dentsu has hired Clemenger Group's David Halter as chief strategy and growth officer of its ANZ business. With over 20 years’ experience providing creative and digital solutions, he was most recently chief strategy officer and Sydney MD of Che Proximity. Halter will join at the at the end of February 2022. In his new role he will partner with Dentsu ANZ CEO Angela Tangas and the broader ANZ executive leadership team.

Elsewhere for Dentsu, the Singapore office has made three strategic senior appointments: Preeti Mascarenhas has joined as chief strategy officer; Florian Lacombe has been promoted to head of operations; and Prema Techinamurthi has been promoted to MD of Creative. Mascarenhas will lead strategy for key integrated clients and pitches, and solutions development. Lacombe will oversee the market’s business transformation journey, from his previous role as head of operations for Dentsu Singapore’s media service line. Techinamurthi takes on the creative baton from Phil Adrien who will be focusing on his role as APAC CEO of Creative. The appointments are effective immediately and come as Dentsu Singapore CEO Prakash Kamdar is expected to commence his additional role as CEO of Indonesia on February 1.

Marketing services group Enero Group has appointed Abigail Dawson as its group communications director. She will be responsible for leading both the internal and external communications and brand marketing for creative agency BMF, digital creative agency Orchard as well as the Enero Group globally. Dawson will report in to Steve McArdle and Wai Kwok, CEOs of BMF and Orchard, respectively. Dawson was previously the brand director at independent agency Special Group Australia, where she led Special’s business development and PR strategy and management. Dawson replaces Lu Borges, who is relocating to the US, where she will take on the role as head of brand and communications for MullenLowe.

At Special Group Australia, Tiffany Hunter has stepped up from team lead to take over Dawson's PR duties (see previous item).