The future, faster.

Sam Sterling, who has been leading our Shanghai team, has been promoted to managing director for the Greater China and Japan region. Sam has been with AKQA for 18 months, and spoke to Campaign Asia about how she will draw upon these two progressive and culturally interesting markets to continue to deliver value for our clients.

Executive creative director Hugo Veiga, whose team returned from Cannes Lions with two Grand Prix wins, has written an opinion piece in the Brazilian journal Dinheiro Vivo, about the ongoing evolution of the creative industry. Highlighting the importance of ambition, and the need to always seek out references and inspiration.

Creative Axel Nygårds appeared in a BBC short film about studio culture. The piece draws insight from a handful of London creative studios, including AKQA, and examines how we’re building and maintaining a collaborative, creative working environment, and what we’re learning through this process.

Experience-design director Nel Johnson attended the 2019 iMedia Online Retailer Summit at Lake Taupo in New Zealand to present to a group of senior e-commerce professionals, on the theme of ‘creating moments that matter’ for their customers.

AKQA business development lead Jazz Advaney was a guest speaker at the 2019 Mirren Live Agency Growth Conference in New York. Jazz appeared alongside chief growth officers and business development directors of VMLY&R, HUGE, TBWA\Chiat\Day, Digitas, and Dentsu Aegis. They examined what it takes to be effective in business development roles.

Senior creative Jacqui Sze appeared as a D&AD New Blood judge, for a Heinz ideas competition which explored new ways to market the traditional tomato ketchup. Jacqui was separately nominated for the D&AD 2019 ‘Next Photographer’ photography award.

Campaign Live has this week announced its Future Female Creative Leaders for 2019. In this year’s list, AKQA senior creative Jacqui Sze has been selected for the ‘Ones-to-Watch’. The list is published in partnership with diversity specialist Creative Equals, and profiles outstanding female talent, Jacqui was recognised for her multidisciplinary skills.

AI practice lead Kathryn Webb has featured in AdWeek to discuss the growing interest in AI’s potential for creativity. The article explores how AI can supplement the creative process rather than simply serving as an element of the finished product.

AKQA New York group creative director Resh Sidhu has featured in Australian journal AdNews to discuss life as a female in the creative industry. The interview explores how no one should have to compromise any professional or personal goal, and the need to seek out mentorship and opportunity, even if that means moving around the world.

AKQA marked International Women’s Day with a host of initiatives and opportunities for employees and clients reflecting the theme of this year’s campaign, Balance for Better.

AKQA Managing Director Rachel Barek has been selected to judge this year’s Shorty Awards. The annual awards show aims to recognise the people and organisations that produce real-time short form content across Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and beyond. Rachel said: “Judging was a great opportunity to examine how truly creative ideas can have an amazing range of influence across a variety of social formats”.

Connection in Chaos, presented by AKQA Associate Strategy Director Yazminca Woodward. In the first of three talks given at AKQA’s Simplification Insight in London, Yazminca explores Connection in Chaos and demanding less from customers. Yazminca shows how companies such as Stripe, Muji and Brandless have thrived by using simplification to expect less and deliver more.

AKQA Executive Creative Director Hugo Veiga has been selected for the Andy Awards 2019 Jury. Upon joining the Jury, Hugo said: “Letting people get a glimpse of what is usually a closed and secretive process through Facebook Live is an amazing service of simplicity, transparency and education for the global community. I’m looking forward to being inspired by the work and the perspective of a jury from such diverse backgrounds”.

Technology Director of AKQA Shanghai, Steven Gutteridge shared his thoughts with The Business of Fashion this week about 5G’s impact on retail. He said: “It will enable not only richer digital experiences but also mass adoption of wearables currently hindered by 4G’s latency”.

The Empower conference, organised by Women in Sport will both identify and help to solve the causes of inequality. The conference will also harness the latest insights, social innovation and best practice evidence to provide solutions.

AKQA Art Director Natalie Vosloo and Creative Jacqui Sze joined the portfolio surgeries, offering advice to students on how to present their work and how to expand on their ideas to form campaigns.

The University of the Arts London has awarded AKQA Creative Director Resh Sidhu the Honorary Doctor of Arts, in recognition of her outstanding contribution to the fields of design, arts, animation, film and technology. The Honorary Doctorate, together with the Honorary Fellowship is the highest honour conferred by the University.

Christine is a global marketing leader with over 15 years experience driving digital acceleration and business performance for agencies and brands around the world. She recently moved to San Francisco from Shanghai where she was leading numerous client service, strategy and digital teams.

AKQA Principal Experience Designer Maggie Chau spoke at Foundry Live, Australia’s most thriving creative speaker programme. Maggie walked students through “Data Driven Design” and explored interesting ways data is being used and collected, as well as the impact that it is making.

AKQA Group Creative Director Michelle Lassman spoke with TheNextGag to discuss Future Lions 2018, her thoughts on the winning ideas and co-hosting the annual seminar in Cannes.

As part of the ‘Visions of the Future’ session at this year’s Impact Week, AKQA Lead Conversational Architect Kathryn Webb discussed the influence of AI on current market research, and how it will further shape the industry during the next 20 years.

AKQA Creative Director Resh Sidhu took to the stage for Immersive Stories at the Audi Dublin International Film Festival. The conference brings together pioneering international thought leaders on Virtual and Augmented Reality to chart new ways of storytelling on immersive platforms.

Sam Sterling has been appointed Managing Director of AKQA’s Shanghai studio, leading the team of 50 people.

Group Creative Director Ginny Golden on AKQA Tree of Lights, explains: “Tree of Lights shared the magic of the holidays and augmented reality to provide a gift to our planet. The idea is a powerful example of the digital world helping protect and preserve the real environment we all share”.

AKQA General Manager Rachel Barek was guest speaker at the 2018 Mirren Account Management Bootcamp in Miami. Rachel spoke about organic growth – sharing tips, case studies and best practices.

AKQA Art Director Natalie Vosloo shared her inspirations, hopes and predictions for 2018 with DigitalArts, along with 25 other leaders in creativity.

AKQA Lead Conversational Architect Kathryn Webb has been selected to judge this year’s Campaign Tech Awards.

This may look like an average day at an AKQA studio, but don’t be fooled. The all-black outfits stood for something else on Tuesday. What started as a conversation between a few friends after watching Oprah at the Golden Globes, went on to become an agency standing together in black to say #TimesUp on harassment, assault and inequality.

AKQA’s Portland studio opened its doors for a networking night in partnership with Women Who Code. AKQA Creative Developer Kathryn Webb shared an engaging presentation on her career evolution. Kathryn discussed her journey from education to employment, and shared key take-aways and lessons learnt along the way.

Group Creative Director Michelle Lassman participated in a Creativeworks panel hosted by Workfront. This interactive luncheon for marketing and agency leaders was an exclusive two-hour event featuring an expert panel and an open room discussion.

AKQA Executive Director, Technology and Delivery Miriam Healy explains the importance placed on creating an even gender balance within the studio and helping to achieve this through recruiting talented female developers from countries such as Ukraine and Russia.

AKQA hosted social media guru Karen Civil for an AKQA Insight in the San Francisco studio. Karen shared her entrepreneurial story and answered questions from the team and clients.

AKQA General Manager Rachel Barek joined a panel this week titled ‘The Client Trends Defining Agency New Business’ at Mirren Live New York, a business conference focused on driving agency growth.

WPPStella hosted its second annual Ignite Show at Google’s Town Hall in London. AKQA Associate Planning Director Aivory Gaw and Creative Developer Kathryn Webb were among the speakers given just four minutes to share their interpretation of the event’s overall theme: Technology.

AKQA’s Portland studio hosted Introduction to the Command Line, the first of many events in partnership with Women Who Code. Nike Technical Lead Richa Khandelwal led 30 women through the workshop with support from AKQA Director of Technical Operations Edd Bignell.

On International Women’s Day this Wednesday, the AKQA team and clients welcomed writer and comedian Viv Groskop; author Emma Gannon and four-time ParalympicsGB sailor Hannah Stodel to an AKQA Insight hosted in London and screened across the global AKQA network.

This week, AKQA AI Practice Lead Kathryn Webb spoke with Adweek about AI’s ability to learn mass amounts of information, giving it a unique advantage when it comes to copywriting.

Kathryn says copywriters shouldn’t view AI as a threat but rather a “member of the creative team” that can provide a diverse viewpoint and maybe even take on some of the more humdrum work that’s not exactly exciting or challenging.

She continues, “I think it actually frees up copywriters to tackle more difficult copywriting tasks,” said Webb. She continued, saying that human-driven copywriting may even increasingly become a “premium product” that marketers seek out for higher-level tasks.