Move and win roundup: Week of February 26, 2018

Campaign compiles a new 'Move and win roundup' as each week progresses.  This edition will cover February 26 through March 2, 2018.  Catch up on past people moves and business wins.

Publicis Groupe APAC announced the departure of Andrew Baxter, chairman of Publicis Communication ANZ and CEO of Publicis Worldwide ANZ. Baxter, who has been with the agency since 2014, will leave at the end of March and will work in the meantime to "transition his responsibilities" to Michael Rebelo, CEO of Publicis Communications in ANZ. Loris Nold, Publicis Groupe APAC CEO, said Baxter had been "a great partner in the transformation of Publicis Worldwide" over the last four years. 

J. Walter Thompson has promoted Umair Shams to the role of business director, relocating him to Islamabad as the dedicated liaison for Ufone. In his previous role, as an account director in Karachi, Shams led the agency's largest client portfolio including Habib Bank Limited, Engro Foods, and Mayfair, contributing towards 60% of revenue in the Karachi office.

TBWA China Group's Media Arts Lab appointed Kara Yang, as managing director in Shanghai. She was most recently chief strategy officer of McCann Worldgroup Shanghai in 2017. The unit has been helping Apple to localise global campaigns but is starting to increase the volume of original creative work for the Greater China region.  

BBDO Shanghai appointed Roy Yeung as group head. He was most recently Y&R Beijing's senior art director servicing Xstep and Dell.

AKQA hired Sam Sterling as Shanghai managing director. She was most recently executive strategy director for the Asia Pacific at Isobar, based in Melbourne. Prior to this, she held senior roles at social marketing firm Tiger Pistol, and trade body Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry. 

Claudia Cristovao has left her position as group creative director at AKQA Tokyo and is understood to be taking up a role at Google. Originally from Portugal, Cristovao spent more than three-and-a-half years at the WPP agency. AKQA is currently looking for a replacement for Cristovao at a creative director level.

Go Sohara has resigned as ECD of J Walter Thompson in Japan after 3.5 years at the agency. Sohara is now creative director and partner at Death of Bad, a marketing studio operating between Los Angeles and Tokyo.

Paul Yang, SVP and general manager of Ruder Finn Beijing, has been appointed to helm the agency's Hong Kong office. He will also take on a new role as national head of the automotive practice for China. Judy Guo will replace Yang in Beijing.

Racepoint Global won four new clients in the healthcare and technology sectors: Applied Materials, China Mobile International, Medix Global and MediaTek. Scope of work includes content development, digital and social media, public relations, influencer mapping, and experiential marketing for the new additions.

Isobar appointed Gary Chi, formerly of McCann Worldgroup, as Taiwan CEO. (Read more) 

Thomas Lau has been appointed regional head of communications for HSBC’s Global Banking and Markets (GMB) in Asia Pacific. He joined HSBC in 2013 from Thomson Reuters, where he was responsible for corporate communications for its financial services business.

Coinsuper added Yolanda Zhang to its team as head of international marketing. She moved from Brunswick Group, prior to which she was at Chong Sing Holdings FinTech Group, Wonderful Sky Financial Group and Hong Kong Trade Development Council. 

HMD Global appointed Nicholas Lim as its APAC head of communications. He will be based in Singapore where he will cover Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Thailand, the Philippines and more. He previously spearheaded market entry, brand-building campaigns and new vertical announcements for Honestbee.

Access Communications was appointed communications agency by Catalog Pte Ltd for Cole Haan in Singapore. The agency will provide PR, communications and events-management services on a retainer basis.

CtrlShift hired Dominic Powers as its new CEO. He was previously chief business officer and advisor to the board. Powers has 20 years' industry experience, and spent the last decade as EVP and MD of Epsilon in Europe and APAC. In his new role at CtrlShift, Powers will lead the adtech provider's growth strategy. He takes over from Deepika Nikhilender, who has stepped down to pursue new opportunities. 

FleishmanHillard Sydney won three new accounts - Henkel, Western Union and Western Digital, and made five new hires. Chris McGhee joined as group account director in the consumer practice; Helen McGuirk as account director; Greg Collins as account manager; Olwyn Flanagan as senior account manager; and Jacky Barker as social media manager. 

Japanese adtech firm FreakOut Holdings hired Narayan Murthy Ivaturi as vice president for Southeast Asia and India. Based in Singapore, Ivaturi will lead the company's growth in the regions. He was previously APAC head of mobile for Mindshare. 

Tourism Fiji named Saatchi & Saatchi New Zealand as its global brand agency of record, following a creative pitch that began in mid 2017. The agency will create a revitalised brand platform and global campaign to attract visitors to Fiji, focusing on key markets Australia, New Zealand, North America, Asia and Europe. 

WPP AUNZ announced that Kantar has appointed Jon Foged as Australian CEO. He will relocate permanently from Singapore, where he was chief strategy and business development officer for Kantar APAC and CEO of Kantar Cambodia and Myanmar, to lead Kantar Millward Brown and Kantar TNS in Australia. Foged has been working in Australia for the last five months. Previous Australia CEO Tania Kullmann has taken a sabbatical to focus on her family. 

B2B creative agency Gyro promoted Rimi Sweis to head of media for APAC. She has held multiple media-account roles within Band Interprise and previously Carat Enterprise, which merged with Gyro under the Dentsu Aegis Network in July 2016. In addition, the agency promoted Geraldson Santos to account director, hired Fathiah Abdul, previously with Carat Singapore, as account manager and appointed Shi Yi, previously with Webnatics, as account executive.

Ken Mandel departed his role as president of innovation and commerce at Publicis Media APAC, with Navaneeta Das, head of product and client development, taking over. (Read more)

Bank Alfalah named Saadia Bukhari as CMO in Pakistan. She was previously with Packages Mall and takes over from Aly Mustansir, who left following a restructuring initiated by new CEO Nauman Ansari, which resulted in the departure of the CFO, CMO, corporate head and HR head. Marketing now falls under the head of retail, and the marketing budget has been reduced by 50%, according to sources. The bank works with MullenLowe Rauf, Ogilvy & Mather and The Brand Crew.

DeVries Global China appointed Elvis Liu as vice president of digital and Robi Yu as director of ecommerce, a newly created role.Both will report to Lydia Shen, managing director for China. Liu was previously with Possible China, where he worked on brands including Unilever, La Prairie, L’Oreal, Sony, Fendi, Estee Lauder, Bayer and Siemens. Yu has 12 years of ecommerce marketing and online shopping analytics experience across a wide range of sectors.

In Jakarta, Growmint appointed Teguh "Ibob" Wibowo, previously creative director of Dentsu Strat (now Dentsu One), as creative director. He will lead the Growmint Brand Unit, a small team focusing on media-neutral brand solutions and branded content. He will also serve as brand design lead.

JCDecaux has won an exclusive seven-year contract for 1,459 bus shelters, awarded by the Land Transport Authority of Singapore. The concession includes 800 advertising panels, including digital screens, in key shopping and financial areas.

Leo Burnett Sydney announced the departure of CEO Peter Bosilkovski and has initiated a search for his replacement. Bosilkovski, who said he will announce his next role in due time, joined the agency’s executive team in 2009 as client services director. He was appointed managing director in 2014 and promoted to CEO In 2015.

Omnicom Media Group will promote Mark Halliday to CEO, Performance following the departure of Lee Smith, who is leaving to "create his own venture". Halliday has been managing director of OMG Programmatic for the past two years and joined the APAC team early in 2013 as head of mobile. Smith oversaw the growth of digital from its infancy as well as the launch of Airwave Mobile, Resolution Media, Accuen (now OMG Programmatic) and most recently, Annalect across APAC.

Grey Group Indonesia appointed Neha Bansal as head of planning and regional planner. She joins from Lowe Lintas India, where she was senior brand planning director. She will oversee all strategic planning processes for Grey Group Indonesia’s key accounts, with a focus on Pantene and P&G. The agency noted that in line with global direction to move the Pantene hub to Jakarta, all subsequent key hires will be based in Indonesia.