Carat/Isobar, BBH and PHD celebrate wins at 2009 Agency of the Year Awards

Carat/Isobar was named Network of the Year, with the Aegis agencies racking up the highest score aggregated over selected categories. Carat’s Shanghai office also picked up the award for North Asia Office of the Year, while Seth Grossman, Carat’s managing director for Eastern China and national head of strategy for Carat Shanghai, was named Account/Business Development Person of the Year.

BBH was named Creative Agency of the Year, with judges recognising its ability to punch above its weight in 2009. Its new business wins also impressed, as did the number of breakthrough campaigns ran by the agency over the year.

In the Media Agency of the Year category, the prize went to another underdog, PHD. Judges noted the huge advances made by the agency over the past 12 months, which has seen the challenger brand turn itself around in the region from a position of relative anonymity. Just as important, though, was the agency’s stellar new business record — PHD won an impressive total of 56 new clients during the year and US$378 million in billings.

"This time last year, PHD was almost an unknown entity in this part of the world. Within a short span of 12 months, the challenger in every single team member emerged, stepped up efforts and has gone on to find better ways to make a name for the brand. This win signifies PHD Asia-Pacific’s growing strength in media innovation and creativity,” said Cheuk Chiang, CEO of PHD Asia-Pacific.

Other winners on the night included Tribal DDB, which was named Digital Agency of the Year, and Phil Talbot, ZenithOptimedia’s CEO for Asia-Pacific, who was given the award for Regional Agency Head of the Year.

Elsewhere, Spencer Wong, Hong Kong group managing director and chief creative officer for China at McCann Worldgroup, was named Creative of the Year, while Jasmine Sohrabji, managing director of OMD India, won the accolade of National Agency of the Year.

For a full list of Agency of the Year winners and runners-up, see here.