Eugene Cheong, Chris Thomas and Morihiro Harano to chair at Spikes Asia 2012

Commenting on his appointment as Craft jury president, Cheong said, "Philosophy is simple: Reward the great stuff and flush all the crap down the loo."

 

Chris Thomas, chairman and CEO of BBDO Asia, Middle East & Africa and Chairman of Proximity Worldwide, started out in the advertising business in 1984 at Dorlands. He next worked at Abbod Mead Vickers BBDO, Ammirati Puris Lintas and Lowe Lintas. In 2003, he was appointed chief executive of Proximity London and during his tenure, the agency was the third most awarded agency in the world. 

 

"Demonstrating the link between creativity and effectiveness must be the industry's number one priority," said Thomas. "We have always known it. But these awards are one of the tools that allow us to prove it."

 

Morihiro Harano, creative director, founder and CEO of Party, Tokyo joined Dentsu in 1994. In 2011 he founded Party with Naoki Ito, Qanta Shimizu, Hiroki Nakamura, and Masashi Kawamura. His works include ‘NTTDocomo: Xylophone', 'Menicon: Magic', 'ToyToyota: Backseat Driver', 'BeeTV' and 'EPOS: 100 Design Cards'. 

 

Harano is a consistent award winner at home and abroad and has received to date Gold Lions at Cannes, a D&AD Yellow Pencil, the ADFEST 360 Lotus, a Good Design Award and the Dentsu Advertising Grand Award. He is a member of D&AD and NY ADC and teaches part-time at Waseda University. 

 

On the category of digital and mobile, Harano commented that in the recent years, digital-related advertising awards has become a place to compete about the speed at which agencies can take advantage of an outside innovator's innovations, such as iPhone and Facebook.

 

"Perhaps, it's time to stop earning points by jumping on the bandwagon of someone else's innovative ideas," said Harano. "We are now in an era when the creativity of new storytelling on the digital platform and the craftsmanship are valued more by the audiences."

 

Delegate registration for Spikes Asia is now open, and anyone registering before 1 August will benefit from the early bird rate. The festival will be held at Suntec Singapore from 16-18 September 2012 and is  the result of a collaboration between Lions Festivals, organisers of Cannes Lions, Dubai Lynx and Eurobest, and Haymarket, publishers of Campaign Asia-Pacific.