New faces on board at BBDO/Proximity Malaysia

BBDO/Proximity Malaysia has been on a recent hiring spree. The agency welcomes VJ Anand as Creative Group Head to work closely with Executive Creative Director Mun Tuck Wai to deliver a fully integrated offering. Vijay arrives at the agency with more than a decade of experience in the digital scene at IDM/Cellnetwork, XM and Ogilvy Interactive as well as ATL (Dark Marketing) with TBWA and Ogilvy. Having spent more than year in Activation and Digital at Riverorchid Bangkok, Vijay is back to rock the digital scene in Malaysia.

Adding to that with immediate effect, Michelle Achuthan will take on anexpanded role as General Manager of both BBDO and Proximity. Achuthanhas almost 20 years of experience in the industry, with the last sixwith BBDO.

“As Michelle sees it, she’s a generalist in a group of specialists andtogether as a team, they will be a formidable force to be reckonedwith,” said Group Chief Executive Jennifer Chan.

While the team will add value to the entire group, the most of the newfaces falls under the rubric of Proximity Malaysia. Karen Koay, AccountDirector is a specialist in both direct and interactive marketing. Shehas a strong understanding of back-end operations and execution ofprojects and is by nature dedicated, accountable and reliable.  She hasworked with Grey, Wunderman as well as Arachnid on key brands such asCelcom, Toyota, Volvo, Mead Johnson, Citibank and Dunhill. SyamsiahYassin, Project Manager, has worked in the interactive industry forfour years on a diverse portfolio which includes categories such asautomobile, FMCG, Corporate and Entertainment. Previous clients haveincluded UMW Toyota, Ford, Coca-Cola, KFC, Unilever (Malaysia &Singapore) and Asia Brands.

Karen Wong, Senior Technology Manager has more than 6 years of digitalexperience in research, mentoring and development. She was previouslywith Yolk (Singapore) where she was the lead interactive researcher anddeveloper; during her tenure she developed projects for SingaporeParliament House, touchscreen interface for DiGi 360 store and XinWang. Openly acknowledged as being the best in her field, thisinnovator has worked on Malaysia’s first motion gesture andpaper-vision integration for a blue chip brand a few years back.

Stephanie Yep, Senior Account Manager has more than 6 years in aspectrum of skills including PR, events and through-the-line integratedadvertising. Prior to joining Proximity, she was with Cheil WorldwideMalaysia, managing and leading the entire integrated advertisingportfolio including the digital business of Samsung mobile for fouryears.

Imiriah Othman, Senior Account Manager brings along with her threeyears of experience in interactive from working with various clientssuch as Samsung Mobile, McDonald’s, BMW/MINI Malaysia, Honda and Volvoat Arachnid Group’s subsidiary Slipknot.

Lay Jian Yi, Art Director for Proximity started his career inmainstream advertising before venturing into digital and CRM and haswon a slew of Kancil, DMAM, Asia Interactive Awards and AAdAsiaawards.Prior to Proximity, Lay worked on a wide portfolio of brands such asHotlink, Air Asia, HP & BMW/MINI Malaysia.

Amidst this great line up of new talent, BBDO/Proximity Malaysia mustbid farewell to Proximity’s Business Director Janet Teo, who will berelocated to Dubai with her husband.

“Janet has done an outstanding job in leading and growingProximity/BBDO and more importantly has been an integral part inhelping identify many of the talent that are now with us. We’re sad tosee her go but family duty calls and we wish her well,” Chan said.