Spotted at Spikes: Piyush Pandey, Prasoon Joshi, Dave Droga, David Guerrero...
Spikes Asia 2009 officially begins on September 16, but Suntec City is already full of leading faces from the global ad fraternity a day before the festival. Spotted at the Mandarin Oriental hotel were Indian ad gurus such as Piyush Pandey and Prasoon Joshi, global visionaries like David Droga and leading figures in Asia like David Guerrero. Judging processes are underway full flow, but barring the odd breaks and the lunch hour, it is near impossible to see the number of ad agency heads in Singapore already.
It is no Cannes Lions, but the efforts that the organisers of the festival, and partner Haymarket, have put in the Spikes Asia 2009, were evident on September 15, 2009, a day before the festival was set to officially commence. Mandarin Oriental, next door to the Singapore International Convention & Exhibition Centre at Suntec City, where Spikes Asia is set to take place, was filled with leading advertising agency heads – specifically from the Asian market and renowned in the global advertising industry.
The first that exchange4media ran into was Droga5’s David Droga, who was busy moving between different groups of people at lunch hour exchanging pleasantries. Droga is the Jury President for TV/Cinema, Print, Outdoor & Radio Jury. David Guerrero of BBDO Guerrero/Proximity Philippines was also spotted, along with some of the other members of the jury in the lunch break.
The warmest exchange was with none other than Piyush Pandey and Prasoon Joshi, who are also part of the TV/Cinema, Print, Outdoor & Radio jury. Speaking on the jury experience, Joshi said, “We are seeing some very good work in the public service category.”
In an informal conversation, some of the jury members mentioned that since the cut-off period of the works that could be entered was March 2009, which was the same as was for Cannes Lions 2009, a significant amount of work was already seen by most of the jury members.
Another Indian jury member spotted at Mandarin Oriental’s restaurant Melt was Candid Marketing’s Atul Nath. Apart from these, not many Indian faces were seen yet in the registration lines or around the event area. But the festival has only just begun.
