The four - former TBWA Korea president Choi Chang-hee, former executive creative director Kim In-seok, former executive account director Han Sung-min and former creative director Yoon Soo-young - will launch their new entity on June 1.
"I wanted to focus exclusively on the creative side of the business," said Choi, the new firm's CEO, who spent four years at TBWA.
The new agency has 20 staff, and has, reportedly, secured two beauty brands from TBWA. Creative Air will be handling TV and print for Mijan-sen and Mirae-pa, both of which are owned by Korean beauty products giant Pacific Cosmetics. It expects to derive around eight billion won (US$7 million) in billings from the two accounts by the end of this year. "Creative Air has a focused vision: we are exclusively working on the creative side, and we expect to be the best in the industry in five years' time," said Choi.
Responding to the departures, TBWA Asia-Pacific regional chairman Keith Smith said: "We promoted our head of client service business, Kang Chul-joong to COO, and it's business as usual."