Phibious Group hires regional strategy officer

Padmalaya's most recent industry post was global planning director for Pond's at Ogilvy Singapore. She left that role in 2013 and spent two years on sabbatical.

Chief strategy officer is a newly created role for Phibious. Padmalaya will be based in Ho Chi Minh City.

Prior to Ogilvy, Padmalaya was regional planning director for Saatchi & Saatchi in Singapore. She has also held roles at JWT and Bates CHI & Partners and has worked in India and Thailand. She has worked with clients such as PepsiCo, Procter&Gamble, Unilever, GSK and Reckitt Benkiser.

"Strategy is at core of all business solutions we provide at Phibious," said Mervyn Cheo, group CEO and managing director of Phibious Vietnam and Indonesia. "[Padmalaya] with her rich experience will be helping us elevate our strategic offering across our network in Southeast Asia. We intend to add significant value to our clients through richer insights and more impactful consulting services that we will be bringing to the table.”

Padmalaya praised the group's mindset and risk-taking, entrepreneurial culture and said an enhanced strategic offering will help deliver more powerful solutions to meet clients' changing needs.

Independent Phibious employs about 140 full-time people in its offices in Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, Myanmar and an association in Laos. The company won seven awards in the 2015 Agency of the Year Awards for Southeast Asia.