Ajay Kakar named Head of Jury for APAC Effie Awards 2014

APAC Effie has announced two of the four Heads of Jury. Kakar is joined by Ben Lightfoot, CEO, McCann Worldgroup Singapore 

BestMediaInfo Bureau | Mumbai | January 14, 2014

(Left) Ajay Kakar and Ben Lightfoot (Right)

APAC Effie has announced the first two of the four Heads of Jury who will form the Judging Committee for the 2014 Awards.

Ajay Kakar, Chief Marketing Officer – Financial Services, Aditya Birla Group, comes with a unique agency-cum-client perspective. He has worked at the agency end for over 14 years at Ogilvy & Mather, across the three key disciplines of direct marketing, advertising and public relations. For the last eight years, he has been a client. Today, he leads marketing across the nine lines of business of the Aditya Birla Financial Services Group that include life insurance, asset management, broking, general insurance broking, online money management, non-banking financial companies (NBFC), private equity, project and structured finance, and wealth management & distribution.

On his appointment as a Head of Jury for APAC Effie, Kakar said, “Having chaired the Effie India Awards for the last three years, I am indeed honoured to now be invited as a Head of Jury for the APAC awards. In recent years, the need and demand for work that works in the marketplace have given the Effie award a pride of place on the shelves of both agencies and marketers. As a Head of Jury I look forward to the exciting opportunity to review the most insightful and impactful campaigns from across the region.”

Ben Lightfoot, CEO, McCann Worldgroup Singapore, was appointed in 2010 after re-establishing McCann's presence in the New Zealand market, where he held a dual role of Creative and Managing Director. With more than 18 years of experience within advertising and communications, Lightfoot has held senior roles in both creative and management across brand, retail, direct and digital, and has been internationally awarded for both strategy and creativity in each of these disciplines.

“We have seen so much great work come out of our region, both in terms of creativity as well as effectiveness. I am really excited to see how the strategies developed led to innovative integrated creative solutions – strategies unique for Asia Pacific, that broke away from category norms and delivered exceptional results," said Lightfoot, who is also APAC Effie Committee Member and Chairman of Effie Singapore.

Commenting on the appointments, Connie Chan, 2014 Awards Chairman, said, “We're delighted to welcome the Heads of Jury on board the Judging Committee. The rich experience and expertise of these heads make up a powerful composition for the Judging Committee, with a good mix of industry leaders from different backgrounds across APAC. We look forward to the great dynamics arising from the interaction and tapping on their perspectives in the judging sessions.”

Finalists will be announced at the end of February, with the Awards Gala set to take place in Singapore in April 2014. For more information, visit www.apaceffie.com.

Organised by the Confederation of Asian Advertising Agency Associations (CAAAA) and Tenasia Group, APAC Effie Awards honours the region's most outstanding marketing communication works that have proven results in meeting strategic objectives. Introduced by the New York American Marketing Association in 1968, the Effie Awards have since been recognised by advertisers and agencies as the pre-eminent award in the advertising industry and global standard of marketing effectiveness excellence. Today, Effie celebrates effectiveness worldwide with the Global Effie, the APAC Effie, the Euro Effie, the Middle East / North Africa Effie and more than 40 national Effie programmes.

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