BBDO Japan strengthens their creative department with three senior appointments

BBDO Japan has hired Martin Heng (pictured centre), Haruko Kuzuya (right) and Takenori “Goten” Hashimoto (left) to complement the agency’s growing creative team.

Singapore-born and long time Japan resident, Senior Creative Director Heng joins from Geometry Global and brings with him 15 years of developing big ideas for clients such as Coca Cola, Audi, Samsung and Dyson, amongst others.

As Head of Creative during his time at Cheil Worldwide, Heng saw the successful launch of the iconic “Samsung Fashion Steps Out”, as well as “Solve For Tomorrow”, a social campaign that encouraged youths to help find solutions for national issues.

Heng is also an avid photographer and has exhibited at the Tokyo Singapore Film Festival and other photography publications in Singapore and Japan.

An industry veteran with more than two decades under her belt, Kuzuya joins from McCann Erickson where she was the creative partner for clients like L’Oreal, Johnson & Johnson, Nestle, Oriental Land (Tokyo Disneyland), JAL, and Wacoal. Kuzuya was part of the team that successfully relaunched the L’Oreal Paris makeup brand in Japan.

Takenori Hashimoto, better known as Goten, began his career at Yomiko before being noticed by renowned Akira Odagiri, who invited Goten to join his boutique agency. Whilst there, he won an award from the prestigious Tokyo Copywriter’s Club.

Goten spent the last eight years in Ogilvy & Mather Japan where he worked on integrated campaigns for a variety of brands across clients like Coca-Cola, Unilever, SC Johnson, and Twinings. He also led the multi-country creative team that won the global Konika-Minolta pitch.

The trio will complement BBDO Japan’s multi-cultural creative department assembled by ECD Masaki Honda, JAAA’s Creator of The Year. Hot on the heels of winning several coveted industry awards, Honda says, “It’s a great honour to welcome these impressive talents. We have high hopes for them and look forward to them further strengthening our creative output.”

Tony Harris, Chief Executive, says “It is always our intention to get an unfair share of the best talent and these three appointments could not have come at a better time. We’ve won a number of high-profile accounts in our first year and we look forward to picking up even more speed.”