Goafest 2013 announces more speakers for Knowledge Seminars

They include Amir Kassaei, Dave Alberts, Ray Velez and Roger Mulchandani

BestMediaInfo Bureau | Delhi | March 22, 2013

The Goafest Committee yesterday announced the names of four globally acclaimed speakers for Goafest 2013 Knowledge Seminars. They are Amir Kassei, Chief Creative Officer, DDB Worldwide; Dave Alberts, Chief Creative Officer, MOFILM; Ray Velez, Global Chief Technology Officer, Razorfish; and Roger Mulchandani, Director, Warc Asia-Pacific.

Goafest 2013 will be held on April 5 & 6 and the Advertising Conclave is scheduled for April 4. The event will be held at the Zuri White Sands in South Goa.

MG Parameswaran, Chairman, Goafest 2013 Knowledge Seminars, said, "We plan to have a really varied set of speakers this year. The second set of names cover a wide knowledge net, from creative to digital to films to strategy. We have a few more names in our list and those will be released next week. The excitement of Goafest 2013 is set to reach a new level!"

Commenting on the lineup of speakers, Nakul Chopra, Chairman of Goafest 2013, said, “This is an enviable line-up of speakers. Indeed they represent the best by global standards across disciplines. Listening to them will be a great learning opportunity for all of us, especially for the young minds from both the advertising and marketing fraternity."

Brief profiles of the speakers:

Amir Kassei

Amir Kassei, Chief Creative Officer, DDB Worldwide, is one of the most lauded creatives in the world. He likes to say “Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion.” He firmly believes that if one has passion, will and courage, one can change the world for the better. Of the advertising business, he says, “It has never been just about advertising. Our business is marketing products, companies and relevant services – and one of our vehicles is advertising.”

Born in Iran, raised in Austria, and educated in France, Kassei settled in Germany in 1997, gaining experience early in his career in a variety of roles ranging from Account Manager to Strategic Planner to Art Director and Designer at agencies such as TBWA, Barci & Partner and Springer & Jacoby. At Springer & Jacoby, he advanced from Copywriter to Creative Director and finally to Executive Creative Director on the global Mercedes-Benz and smart accounts.

Dave Alberts

Dave Alberts, Chief Creative Officer, MOFILM, has in the last twenty years lived on four continents and created award-winning multiplatform campaigns in over 42 countries for some of the world's largest brands. He has successfully run creative agencies in Asia (twice Asian Agency of Year) and Australia (Agency of Year), and was most recently Chairman and Creative Director of Grey London where he created the highly acclaimed AOL Discuss campaign, a seminal campaign in multiplatform socially relevant content.

In 2011, Alberts joined MOFILM as Chief Creative Officer responsible for helping to curate and define MOFILM's creative direction. The company encourages budding filmmakers to download a brief provided by an affiliated brand and create an ad that answers the brief. The winning ad then appears in that brand's marketing campaign. He helps brands fine-tune those briefs to ensure that the company receives a range of diverse responses. He also works with MOFILM's community of filmmakers to ensure high-quality submissions.

Ray Velez

Ray Velez, Global Chief Technology Officer at Razorfish, has a passion for technology that began when he wrote his first basic programme on his Atari 800. Velez studied computer science and philosophy at Boston University, USA, looking to bring the answered and unanswered together, and he has been fortunate enough to be able to keep this mission alive through his work at Razorfish. According to Velez, the thing that keeps his job exciting is its fresh and ever-changing nature, a feature that he has always loved about the climate at Razorfish and the industry as a whole.

As Global Chief Technology Officer for Razorfish, Velez manages the agency's capabilities in Web technology strategy, architecture and development, overseeing all of the company's technologists. A core part of this role involves looking to the community for collaboration, and he is consistently amazed by technologies like good old message boards and wikis. In fact, he helped Razorfish build their internal, award-winning Wiki.

Roger Mulchandani

Roger Mulchandani, Director of Warc Asia-Pacific, spent the better part of the last decade working in a variety of roles covering financial services, consultancies, and marketing companies. He has had the good fortune of working in the US, the UK, and now Singapore in roles that make the most of working with senior clients within leading-edge companies across the globe.

These roles have taught Mulchandani how to manage diverse stakeholders and lead global cross-functional teams to “make things happen”. They have also allowed him to demonstrate the skills necessary to set and implement strategy, manage and coach teams, and utilise engaging communications skills to support overall business growth.

The Goafest Committee had earlier released the first list of speakers which included distinguished advertising and marketing professionals like Shiv Singh, Global Head of Digital, PepsiCo Beverages; Thomas Bernardin, Chairman and Director, Leo Burnett Worldwide; Mark Tutssel, Chief Creative Officer, Leo Burnett Worldwide; and Nick Vale, Global Planning Director, Maxus Worldwide.

For the record, Goafest 2013 will be in its 8th edition and for the 6th consecutive year AAAI and The Advertising Club will come together to deliver India's premier awards that celebrate creativity.

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