Valerie Madon joins Havas as chief creative officer for Southeast Asia + creative lead for GSK

Havas has lured Valerie Madon from her Facebook Creative Shop role to join the network in the dual role of Chief Creative Officer for Southeast Asia and Creative Lead for GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) business for APAC.

In her new role, Madon (pictured) will be responsible for the creative output of all Havas agencies in Southeast Asia.

Working closely with the creative leads from the nine markets, where the agency has a presence, she will play an important role in advancing Havas’ creative ambitions in the region by helping to build a solid creative foundation for the network through regional collaboration.

Additionally, in her concurrent role as Creative Lead on GSK in Asia Pacific, she will be responsible for delivering world-class creative output on the key global and regional brands managed out of Havas’ GSK Hub in Singapore.

She joins the agency from Facebook, where she was the Head of Creative Shop for Southeast Asia, a position she held since joining in December 2015. Prior to that, she was the Global ECD on Shell Lubricants at JWT concurrently holding the role of Chief Creative Officer in Singapore. She started her career with digital agency XM Asia and has also had a long stint with Leo Burnett/Arc and later Publicis Modem.

Over the course of years, she has made her mark at Cannes Lions, One Show, London International, Effies, Golden Drum, Spikes Asia, Adfest and the Webby’s. She is also the two- time winner of Digital Creative of the Year Award at Singapore’s Hall of Fame Awards and has been voted as Singapore’s Most Influential CD for five consecutive years by Institute of Advertising Singapore.

She will report into Vishnu Mohan, CEO of Havas Group, Southeast Asia & India and will work closely with Christian Pattman, the Executive Global Client Director of GSK at Havas APAC.

Commenting on the appointment, Mohan said, “As we accelerate the implementation of Havas Group’s “Together” strategy in the vibrant and high growth ASEAN, we are delighted to have Valerie on board. Her experience in creative, digital and media disciplines makes her a natural fit for our differentiated approach of a client-centric unified Havas Village model.”

On her appointment, Madon commented, “My time at Facebook as Head of Creative Shop for Southeast Asia made me realise that media strategy and the creative idea cannot be separated. I knew if I were to return to the “agency world”, it has to be a place that believes in this too and is committed to making changes for a new creative process. All the recent headlines from Havas confirms this and more, and I am excited and honoured to be on this journey with them.”

Madon is highly regarded creative with a firm foundation in digital and considerable experience in developing integrated creative solutions for blue chip brands like Hewlett-Packard, Procter & Gamble, Singapore Airlines, HSBC and Burger King.