Created as the first advertising festival for the Middle Eastern & North African region, the MENA Cristal Festival announces the President of the 5th edition of the Festival, to be held from 1 to 5 February in Mzaar Kfardebiane, Lebanon.
Richard Pinder will chair a master jury composed of all jury presidents to decide the Festival Grand Cristal - which will be chosen from the Grand Cristal awarded for each competition. The jury presidents include:
- John Merrifield , Creative at Large – TBWA\Asia Pacific, president of the Film, Outdoor, Press and Radio competition
- Iain Jacob , Chief Executive EMEA – Starcom MediaVest Group, president of the Media Jury
- Nicke Bergström, Creative Director and Founder – Farfar Sweden, President of the Cyber Jury
- Alfonso Marian , Executive Creative Director – Shackleton Madrid, President of the Promo & Direct Jury
The judging will take place at the Intercontinental Mzaar, official venue for the three-day Festival.
Christian CAPPE, CEO of the Cristal Festival, organizer of the Mena Cristal Festival commented: “The Mena Cristal Festival is a celebration of the Middle East and North Africa’s best creative ideas in advertising and communications. We wanted to award the Presidency of the Festival to a world-class leader in the business. We are delighted that Richard Pinder has accepted. Richard will, without any doubt, enhance our Festival content and creative conversations. His appointment as Festival President will help the Festival achieve its ultimate goal: to highlight the creative dynamism of the MENA region.”
Said Richard Pinder, chief operating officer, Publicis Worldwide, “As Middle East and North African countries become increasingly confident in their own culture and their own ability to communicate in ways that are breaking the norms, they are finding their own voice. Recognition and celebration of great communication is now more crucial than ever”.
Richard Pinder stepped up to take sole leadership of the Publicis global network in May 2009 which, with 9000 employees in over 80 markets, is the founding pillar and largest agency network of the Publicis Groupe. He is a member of Publicis Groupe’s P12 Management Board and reports directly to Maurice Lévy, Chairman and CEO of Publicis Groupe. He was appointed chief operating officer of Publicis Worldwide in October 2006 and has been part of Publicis Groupe since its acquisition of Bcom3 in 2002.
Richard’s career in advertising spans over twenty years, with a wide range of experiences in different sectors of the advertising and communications industry. He has managed national, multinational and global clients and has worked extensively in Europe and Asia in top-level positions that attest to his leadership skills and proven adaptability.
Since early 2008 he has focussed the Publicis Worldwide network on Creating Contagious Ideas that Change the Conversation around clients’ brands. This has demanded a network with a series of new tools that is a leader in digital and a strong performer in creativity as well as a network that is brilliant at understanding local cultures.
With a major investment programme of acquisitions and start ups, Publicis Modem is now a formidable global digital network of 40 offices and over 1,000 digital specialists allowing Publicis Worldwide to take a leadership position in digital.
Under his leadership, Publicis Worldwide’s creative reputation is gaining recognition and landing local accolades. Eurobest 2009 saw Publicis make Network of the Year Top Three for the very first time. In Asia, Publicis is the second most creative network in the region. Publicis agencies have won Agency of the Year in Brazil, France and Australia. In Belgium, Duval Guillaume landed the Kinsale Shark Grand Prix. Publicis USA was awarded Adweek’s highest agency grade alongside Goodby, Crispin, Martin and Wieden for the second year running.
The Publicis global network delivers consistent strong growth from existing clients – including HP’s pan-European $150m PSG (Personal Systems Group) advertising and digital communications and P&G’s $200m global Crest assignment, plus new international assignments from Malibu ( £25m), Carrefour (€1billion), Beck’s Beer, Mumm champagne and Marriott hotels.
Before joining Publicis, Richard was President of Leo Burnett's EMEA region where he re-established the network’s growth track by focussing Leo on creativity and broadening its holistic offer through the strengthening of Arc, the marketing services arm of Leo.
Prior to leading EMEA, in 2000, Richard was Regional Managing Director of Leo Burnett Asia Pacific. Under his leadership, Leo Burnett consistently ranked in the top three in terms of creativity, business activity and market share in nearly every country in the region. By consistently championing creative and strategic excellence, Richard also led the network to strong local and regional new business performance.
The early years of Richard’s career were spent at Grey Advertising in London where he rose from Graduate Trainee to Client Services Director. Richard then joined Ogilvy & Mather as UK Managing Director before moving to Leo Burnett in Asia Pacific.
More than 500 advertising professional leaders from 20 different countries in the region are expected to attend the 5th edition of the MENA Cristal Festival.
