Meridian Communications in Mumbai - part of the WPP holding group, has  appointed Ogilvy's Anuraag Khandelwal and Satish deSa as Executive Creative Directors and will assume this new responsibility with effect from June 1.
 
Announcing the appointment, Piyush Pandey, Executive Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy Group, South Asia, said, "Meridian has found itself two young men who are very ambitious and full of exciting ideas. I have asked them to make Meridian a place that gives their friends at Ogilvy sleepless nights. I'm sure it will be healthy competition and result in some great advertising on both sides of the family."
 
Together Khandelwal (pictured at bottom) and deSa (pictured at top) boast a collective wealth of 26 years industry experience that will reinforce Meridian's creative output. A major part of their career has been spent forging a fantastic partnership at Ogilvy, Mumbai. During their association here, they have created stellar campaigns for big brands like TATA Motors, IPL, Cadbury, Tata Sky, Aegon Religare Life Insurance, Unilever's Beverages, Oberoi Realty and Hutch, to name just a few. Over the years, they have together collected metal, both nationally and internationally.

UPDATED STORY TO INCLUDE VIDEO: In conjunction with the 100th Anniversary of the Faber-Castell's premium range of Polychromos Artist Color Pencils, Ogilvy & Mather Singapore has released a short film showing an artist crafting famous art pieces like "The Scream" by Edvard Munch and "Terrace Café at Night" by Vincent Van Gogh, using thousands of Faber-Castell colour pencils as the medium itself.

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 "In total, about 1176 hours went into sawing, sanding, sharpening, gluing and crafting 125,000 Faber-Castell colour pencils," explained Steve Back, CCO.

Ivy Ong, Faber-Castell Sales and Marketing Manager, "The Faber-Castell Polychromos Artist Colour Pencils feature high-quality leads in 120 shades of color and has been used by artists for 100 years now. This is a fantastic idea that is relevant in showcasing the rich hues and tones of our coloured pencils through these masterpieces."

Since its launch just over a month ago, Magnum Pleasure Hunt 2 Across the Globe has reached over one million players worldwide, who each spend an average of more than three minutes trying to achieve their highest score in the best possible time.

This satire celebrates the competitive spirit of the Modern Malayalee. A Day in the Life of Kerala is an authentic news commentary on the state of Kerala today, where competition breeds chaos between Communism and Capitalism.

Like the metaphor of Indian crabs in a can, it's always been Brother versus Brother, Neighbour versus Neighbour, Left party versus Right party, Left bank versus Right Bank.

VIEW THE SPOT

BEST TV
FAVORITE: Polo: Father and Daughter. This spot had me from beginning to end. Great story. Perfect music. Excellent directing. Fantastic little moments. OK, so I'm I new father. But I would've loved it even if I wasn't. Although, would I have gotten all choked up and pretended not to be teary-eyed when someone walked into the room as I was watching the spot? We'll never know.
RUNNER UP: Flying Horse: Cat Toast. Normally, I'm not a fan of weird for weird sake. But I'm also not a fan of cats. So those forces seemed to have cancelled out here and left me chuckling. And it's for an energy drink. So I think they kind of get a pass on having to make a whole lot of sense.

The Hong Kong Animal Adoption Center (HKAAC) believes that every animal should have a home where they can be cared for and be loved and nurtured. They hope to highlight the joyous experiences with pets and to build empathy with people so that more animals will be adopted.

Leo Burnett Hong Kong borrowed from cultural contexts of iconic animals in comics that we have all known since we were young. They then created three visuals using real dogs and cats to resemble these icons in their classic scenes. The agency hopes to motivate people and instill empathy in them so that they too will want to adopt a pet and create their own unique story with them.

LBBOnline's 3rd annual Plage Courage is set to storm La Croisette Beach again this year during the Cannes Lions Festival.

La Plage Courage will be running from Tuesday June 19 through Friday June 22 from 10-18:00 with invitation-only events planned in the evenings. La Plage Courage is open to anyone from 10-18:00, except during private events and parties. More on these events coming soon as La Plage will play host to the Rushes, Campaign Magazine and M&M parties, a private luncheon and daily Happy Hour with free wine and beer.
 
La Plage Courage is the place to meet and mingle in Cannes. It's a great place to meet clients and colleagues on the beach with free Wi-Fi, free sun loungers, a full restaurant and bar with brilliant and friendly staff and Happy Hour most evenings with free beer and wine.

FutureBrand has appointed Zayn Khan as CEO Asia Pacific. The appointment brings Khan (left) to Shanghai from Kuala Lumpur, where he has been based since 2002, most recently serving as CEO and partner at Thinkscape. He will report directly to Patrick Smith, CEO FutureBrand Worldwide.

Khan has significant experience in building brands and shaping marketing strategy across a wide range of industries. While at Thinkscape, Khan set the company on a new vision and built a strong consulting offering to complement the company's design and architecture practices, leading the team to win major new business in government, telecommunications, banking, beauty and entertainment industries in both Asia and the Middle East.

Recently Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising in Thailand moved to the Sindhorn Building on Wireless Road, Bangkok. The move was part of a plan from Publicis group to locate their affiliated companies in one building for shared resources.
 
The new office design would be a challenging project, as both the space and the budget were limited, and the building is somewhat dated.
 
Being a fan of architecture, and even a student of UT Austin's Summer Academy of Architecture, Regional Creative Director Joel Clement volunteered to lead the project on Saatchi's behalf.  He contacted an architect whose work he had been following, aptly named Supermachine Studio. "There are many interior and architecture firms in Thailand, but I wanted Supermachine for this project as they have a proclivity for fun and playful designs," said Clement. "I first learned of them in some of the trade magazines, like art4d, but then became a fan of their blog."
 
"My brief to Jack (Pitupong) and his team was to create a space that inspires, is genuinely fun to come to everyday, and that didn't take itself too seriously." Clement and Supermachine also steered the new design to signal an important shift in the company, which he refers to as the Rebirth of Saatchi Thailand.

Mark Ringer, Executive Creative Director at TBWA\Hong Kong is a serial Cannes delegate and former juror. He will be popping in to the Festival for a couple of days this year but before everyone heads there he offers a few remedies for "Cannes Fatigue".

Cannes Lions; eight days, about 200 speakers, 15 separate awards presentations, production companies' parties, your network's stuff, the holding companies' stuff, your agency obligations, your clients needs, and old friends and acquaintances. And it is wonderful. Until it isn't.
 
In fact Cannes is a little bit like having an orgasm while sitting on a durian. Overall it's pleasurable, but there will be painful moments.
 
It is 'Cannes Lions Fatigue' and I prescribe the following diversions to get you through the week.

DDB Group Hong Kong has appointed Nateepat Jaturonrasmi (Yun) as Creative Director, effective immediately. Yun will work alongside Asawin Phanichwatana (Bear) who rejoined the agency as Head of Art last September.
 
Originally from Thailand, Yan joins DDB from Leo Burnett Hong Kong. He has also had stints at Leo Burnett Bangkok, Publicis Bangkok and Grey Worldwide Bangkok. With more than 12 years in advertising, Yun has worked on clients such as Chevrolet, McDonald's, Alive (Coca-Cola Company), ITV (TV Channel), Skoda, Pantene and Dairy Queen.

Fast Company has named Elvis Chau (left), JWT Shanghai's Executive Creative Director, as one of the 100 Most Creative People in Business, alongside Bjork, Foursquare executive Alex Rainert, Hip Hop Public Health founder Olajide Williams, Starbucks Chief Digital Officer Alan Brotman and Steven Zietels, Director of Laryngeal Surgery and Voice Rehabilitation at MGH.
 
Fast Company's annual creative list, will appear on the print edition on newsstands on May 22.

For seventeen years, FHM magazine has been synonymous with the Sexiest Women in Existence, the ranking of sexiest women alive through public voting.

But now, FHM wants to shake and spice things up by asking readers to vote for the Sexiest Women in NON - Existence. Forget real women, FHM needs your help to decide which imaginary woman deserves to wear the very real crown. Whether you secretly desire the Queen of Hearts, Wilma Flintstone or the Statue of Liberty, you can rock the vote at http://www.theother100.com

Partnering with BBH Asia Pacific, FHM will announce the winner in a groundbreaking, special edition issue, which will feature all 100 girls scandalously re-imagined by top artists from around the world.

Douglas Hamilton, Deputy Creative Director, BBH Asia Pacific said, "FHM doesn't need ads, it's infamous enough. Instead, we've co-created a new product, the Sexiest Women in Non-Existence issue will give readers something to look forward to every year, and give sexy imaginary women everywhere the recognition they deserve."

The 2012 EFFIE Awards have set a new record high with 78 entries this year, beating all previous records of the EFFIE history in the Hong Kong chapter of the International EFFIE Awards, originating from New York. The 28 medals selected will be awarded on 31 May, 2012.
 
The EFFIE Awards are a celebration of creative and effective advertising that reinforces teamwork between agency, client and researchers. According to Iris Lo, Chairlady of the 2012 EFFIE Committee, "EFFIE Awards is a great opportunity to equip yourself for embracing the new technologies in to a relentless changing advertising world. Also, the essentials in effectiveness campaign are not only in the creativity, they also need to balance in usages of new technology and creativity without losing human touch. We are proud of the result this year and it's a most important recognition for our effort to create a most significant marketing effectiveness award in town."

TBWA\ has announced the launch of TBWA\Luxury Arts in China, a business unit dedicated to marketing luxury brands, based in Shanghai. TBWA\Luxury Arts provides global and local luxury brands with expertise on launching and growing their brands in China. TBWA\Luxury Arts will provide expertise in the luxury market, unique insights into high net worth individuals as well as strategic planning, advertising, events, retail, brand identity and all other realms of the luxury brand experience.

(From left to right) Ian Thubron, Group President of TBWA\Greater China; Natacha Dzikowski , Managing Director of TBWA\Luxury Arts; Richard Cotton, Head of TBWA\Luxury Arts, Shanghai\Greater China; Jeff Ma, Chief Marketing Officer of TBWA\Greater China.

To celebrate the 10th anniversary of the foundation of Grupo ABC, the largest communications group in Latin America, President Bill Clinton will address delegates at the 59th Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

Taking to the stage in the Palais des Festivals in Cannes on Thursday evening 21 June, President Clinton will deliver a keynote speech at the event titled How Advertising Can Help Build a Better World.

President Clinton established the William J. Clinton Foundation with the mission to improve global health, strengthen economies, promote healthier childhoods, and protect the environment by fostering partnerships among governments, businesses, nongovernmental organisations (NGOs), and private citizens to turn good intentions into measurable results.

The Alchemy Partnership recently acquired two new business wins in the form of NETS and Ben & Jerry's. The appointment of the agency by NETS sees the return of Alchemy after a two-year break. The agency, which helped develop the current corporate identity system for NETS four years ago, were re-appointed in January to promote NETS as Singapore's favorite mode of payment, preferred over cash. The campaign was launched above and below-the-line last month.

Ben & Jerry's, a Unilever brand, appointed Alchemy as its "creative agency" in February to handle its below-the-line communications.

Alchemy's Managing Partner, Michael Liew, said, "These two wins are significant in that they signal that Alchemy has come a long way since being founded just seven short years ago. We've established ourselves as the leading home-grown agency here with a roster of heavyweight clients who trust in our strategic and creative ability to compete with the international agencies and to deliver."

New Zealand - The Pedigree Adoption Drive offers support to thousands of abandoned dogs across the country. While the numbers hadn't dropped, public interest had.

Colenso BBDO, Auckland needed to find a new way to connect.

By adapting the way 3D glasses work they were able to simultaneously project two entirely different films on the same cinema screen.

The groundbreaking project was created in partnership between FINCH and Colenso BBDO.

VIEW THE DONATION GLASSES - UNRESCUED CONCEPT
VIEW THE DONATION GLASSES - RESCUED CONCEPT

'Are you fan enough?' - Carlsberg launches an integrated campaign for UEFA Euro 2012.

Developed by Euro RSCG Kuala Lumpur, this campaign challenges Malaysian football fans to show what they would do to win one of 100 UEFA EURO 2012 all expenses paid trips.


VIEW VIDEO 1.
VIEW VIDEO 2.

The campaign appears in online, print and POSM and aims to amplify the brand's positioning of being the reward for courageous acts.

Nestlé Ice Cream and Social@Ogilvy, a cross-discipline team of social experts from OgilvyOne and Ogilvy Public Relations Beijing, have launched a fun and exciting digital campaign to promote BenNaNa, a peelable, banana-shaped ice cream, in mainland China.

The playful two-part campaign consists of a microsite based on the kid-friendly theme of a magical island conceptualized and created by OgilvyOne. The second part is a hugely popular corporate Sina Weibo account complete with bespoke funny videos created and managed by Ogilvy PR that has seen close to three million users share posts or upload their own BenNaNa pictures.

Jaime De Silva has been appointed Public Relations Manager for Grey Group Singapore. Reporting to Subbaraju Alluri, CEO of Grey Group, Jaime will manage public relations for a number of existing clients across the Grey portfolio.

Commenting on the appointment, Raju said, "We are excited to welcome Jaime on board. With her, we wiil be strenthening further our public relations component. Jamie's expertise in PR will help our integrated offering to clients which includes traditional and digital capabilities."

Jaime joins Grey Group from Sydney where she most recently held a post as Public Relations Manager for NineMSN, looking after consumer and trade communications for the company.  

With over 186 stores successfully operating across 12 states, Easyday, the retail brand of Bharti Retail, caters to households' shopping needs across Food & Grocery, Home Furnishings, Electronics, Consumer durables and Clothing through three different store formats. The business will be handled out of Lowe Lintas & Partner's Delhi office.

'We are extremely thrilled to partner with Bharti Retail and we look forward to building a powerful brand that touches the life of every Indian in the years to come. The retail market in India is growing rapidly and Bharti Retail and its Easyday stores will play a very prominent role to expand the category. We will partner them in delivering a distinctive brand promise that will make the brand a leader in the market.' said Naveen Gaur, Executive Director & Delhi office Head of Lowe Lintas & Partners.

Farrokh Madon has been appointed Chief Creative Officer for Y&R Singapore. A renowned and much-awarded creative, Madon's CV is a veritable 'who's who' of top agencies and blue-chip clients.

He has won over 100 prestigious creative awards, including multiple Cannes Lions, Grand Prix at AdFest, multiple Gold Spikes and a D&AD Silver Nomination. Madon was the brains behind Singapore's Most Effective Advertising, becoming the only winner of the Grand Prix in the history of the Singapore Effie Awards. He was the driving force behind creative work that has been featured on CNN's Anderson Cooper show and FOX News, and for 5 consecutive years he was named as one of Singapore's most influential creative directors by the Institute of Advertising Singapore (IAS).

Droga5 Sydney has created a film featuring Phill Pace, a contender for the Mr Australia
bodybuilder title, to launch Domestos' new toilet cleaner.

The film follows a typical day in the life for Phill as he eats his way to the title.

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Ogilvy & Mather Malaysia and JWT Shanghai picked up two Gold Pencils each at The 2012 One Show Awards. Their success came for their already multi-awarded Samsonite and Pictionary work. O&M Malaysia also picked up 3 Silver awards - two for their Lego outdoor campaign and one for Pictionary.

A Gold pencil was also awarded to Grey Group Shanghai for World Kitchen "Vending Machine".

Asia's share of pencils included 5 Gold, 5 Silver and 5 Bronze. A total of 115 Gold, Silver and Bronze Pencils were awarded, representing 26 different countries, with "Best of Show" honors going to Mother New York for its innovative "Little Marina" campaign created for Target.

Subway stations in Hong Kong have been dominated by the fabulous new images from the latest 'Let's Gap Together' campaign, shot by Annie Leibovitz and created by Y&R Shanghai. The latest phase of the campaign, which recently launched in mainland China and Hong Kong, pairs icons from the US and China, celebrating both their commonality and their individuality.

Beautifully photographed by legendary American portrait photographer, Annie Leibovitz, this phase saw the six talents paired as Originals (Angelababy & Pharrell Williams), Visual Vanguard (Cui Xiuwen & Aaron Young) and Rockers (Muma & Juliet Simms). All are renowned individuals in their industry and share the same common passion for what they do. They were selected specifically as it was felt they epitomize the freedom of embracing one's passion and expressing one's individuality.

Your body is 50% made up of water which is something BBH Shanghai don't want you to forget.


VIEW THE IDEA

Ogilvy & Mather New Delhi promote lemon tarts in this new print work for Angels in my Kitchen.

Credits - Executive Creative Director: Ajay Gahlaut. Creative Directors: Preeti Koul Choudhery, Vikash Chemjong, Nitin Srivastava. Copywriters: Sushant Barua, Shadab Abidi. Art Director: Nasheet Shadan. IIllustrator: Nasheet Shadani. Designer: Nasheet Shadani.

The Samsung Galaxy Note is a new kind of mobile device - a tablet / smartphone hybrid - that brings the "personal touch" back into mobile technology with its unique precision S pen that allows you to express yourself freely and organically by writing, sketching, cut-n-pasting on the Note, inviting your mind to wander and think freely. Hence the line... "Feel Free Ideas". Leo Burnett Malaysia created an outdoor campaign that would not only clearly communicate the product story but also demonstrate what the Note can actually do by literally drawing and illustrating our "KL Note Wrap" OOH campaign with it.

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Billboard Kwok has rejoined the Ogilvy Group in a dual role as Managing Director of OgilvyOne Shanghai and as Vice President of E-Commerce, OgilvyOne China, a newly created role.

In his first role Kwok takes over from Tom Wan, the former Mananging Director of OgilvyOne Shanghai, who has been strategically appointed as Regional Asia Pacific Head of the Philips account.

Kwok's leadership roles entail both leading OgilvyOne Shanghai's digital operations and business growth while developing and strengthening its e-commerce offering, a core competency for OgilvyOne across China. In helping President of OgilvyOne China, Angel Chen, chart the agency's strategic direction across China markets, Kwok will oversee accounts for a number of domestic and international brands.

Leo Burnett India has created a very crafty campaign for Bajaj Exhaust Fans that allow you to reclaim your space from foul odors.

Credits - National Creative Director: KV Sridhar. Executive Creative Director: Nitesh Tiwari. Creative Director: Vikram Pandey. Art Director: Brijesh Parmar. Photographer: Amol Jadhav. Brand Partner: Sushma Singh. Brand Associate: Adya Thakur.

Draftfcb will again sponsor the Roger Hatchuel Academy for the third straight year in partnership with the 59th Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, taking place from 17 to 23 June.

Introduced in 2003, the Roger Hatchuel Academy provides a group of international students in advertising, marketing, communications or design an invaluable one week training and education course. Brainchild of the former Festival Chairman and named in his honour, the course is an investment in the future of the industry.

Ogilvy & Mather China will once again host  ihaveanidea's annual Portfolio Night event in mainland China. Taking place around the world on May 23, 2012, including Beijing and Shanghai, Portfolio Night 10 marks the third time in four years that Ogilvy will be partnering as the host agency in China.

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ihaveanidea's Portfolio Night is the world's largest simultaneous advertising portfolio review, featuring hundreds of top creative directors who will meet with thousands of aspiring young
creative hopefuls globally in one night to offer professional advice, network and recruit. Every candidate who attends will get 45 minutes of undivided attention with 3 top creatives from a number of the world's best agencies.

Song Zu has added to its previous award haul by winning the only Gold Clio handed out for Original Music in the 2012 Clio Awards. The Gold Clio was for Bundy 5 'Ain't No Nancy Drink' which has previously won gongs at AWARD, London International and Adfest.

Song Zu's work on Smirnoff Pure was also awarded a Bronze for Music Adaptation and both of these award-winning spots were for Leo Burnett, Sydney. 

SongZu was recently crowned Australian Creative Music and Sound Hotshop for 2011. To view Song Zu's Hotshop submission including Bundy 5 and Smirnoff go to songzu.com

DDB Group Hong Kong has launched an activation and online campaign for Skittles to strengthen engagement with teens and ensure Skittles are part of their routine candy repertoire. Entitled 'Skittles - Beat the rainbow', the idea behind the campaign is to leverage on the popular folk sorcery in Hong Kong of the villain beating ceremony. This is also know as 'beating the little person' - its purpose is to 'beat away' the bad luck caused by your enemies.

Jeffry Gamble, ECD of DDB Group Hong Kong said, "Skittles turns this sorcery on its head and brings some unexpected fun to the folklore. We created 'Skittles Beat the rainbow' smartphone app, which provides an engaging platform for teens to virtually beat their 'little person'."

BBDO Proximity China has released a new viral film in their "The People's Car Project" campaign for Volkswagen.

The campaign makes the ideas of competition winners a "reality". Firstly, Volkswagen gathers ideas from the people of China to help innovate future cars. They took one girl's idea for a hover car and made it into reality.



VIEW THE VIRAL
VIEW THE TEASER
VIEW THE PREVIOUS AWARD WINNING WORK

In this campaign from Y&R Singapore, Health supplement Brand's Essence of Chicken is advising young people to 'Stay Switched On, Stay Open to Opportunities', Encompassing television, print, outdoor and on-pack, the campaign shows the positive opportunities that can be missed when you don't stay alert.

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The TVC shares the cautionary tale of aspiring young actress Janet, who could have been the star of action movie 'The Beautiful Spy', if she been alert enough to spot the clues when sharing an elevator with the film's director. The movie's female star is then seen drinking the health tonic as Janet can only look on in wistful admiration.

Thailand recently suffered a huge flooding natural disaster. After the flood water subsided Canon, through Leo Burnett Bangkok, utilised some of the sandbags in a unique way to bolster the spirits of people in Bangkok.

VIEW THE IDEA

This Diamond Coffee outdoor campaign from Leo Burnett Hong Kong shows how everyone depends on you to stay awake - in this case a school bus driver and an office worker. The campaign has just collected two Bronze awards at the Clio Awards this week.

Credits - Executive Creative Director: Connie Lo. Creative Director: Nutchanun Chiaphanumas. Copywriters: Spring Liu, Nutchanun Chiaphanumas. Art Director: Nateepat Jaturonrasmi. Account Executives: Kennie Chung, Karen Peng. Illustrator: Remix Studio. Photographer:    Anuchai Secharunputong, Nok Pipattungkul. Production House: Remix Studio. Production House Producer: Voratorn Sathiensri