Yang Yeo to quit JWT for Wieden+Kennedy Shanghai

The outgoing China chairman cum North Asia ECD will fill one of W+K's top creative leadership roles. Michael Simons and Achilles Li currently both serve as executive creative directors. Simons will leave the agency 1 July 2014 and Li later in the summer.

During Yang's tenure, JWT has won powerhouse awards such as China's first Cannes Lions Grand Prix for Samsonite. "JWT will always have a very special place in my heart," he said. "The consolation is that I'm leaving the network in great shape and can see that the APAC operation will only get stronger under the spiritual leadership of Lo Sheung Yan and Tom Doctoroff."

“But I feel now is the right time to return to an independent setup where the creative product is at its core.” Yeo will leave JWT in July and commence at W+K in August. JWT is looking for his successor and expects to announce that appointment in the near future.

"Yang has a tremendous range of talents beyond advertising, including architecture and spacial design,” commented Colleen DeCourcy, W+K’s global co-executive creative director. He represents "a new kind of leader, in that he is deeply immersed in the business and creative communities of the region,” added Mark Fitzloff, also W+K’s global co-executive creative director.