WPP

I worked as a consultant with WPP twice - once to build and launch the first web portal in Mainland China - in Mandarin. The second time as MD of JWT Vietnam.

In China in 2000 the internet was in its early startup phase with China being more restrictive and controlled than the Western world. The creation of a sensitive Media project was allowed because we were working with the very top people at WPP and Beijing Telecom. The project was based in Beijing.

We researched the growth of the internet through CNNIC and realised quite quickly that what we were seeing was an exponential rise in internet adoption and usage. We also quickly realised that we were operating in a closed market which meant that we needed to create our own local strategy and then build the site, create and convert site content, sell the ad space, and build a base of users - all in parallel.

We made content agreements in Sports, Entertainment, Games, News and Finance and developed a strategy with Kevin O'Connor from Doubleclick to monetise the site through advertising. Kevin personally flew to China to meet with us.

In parallel we built out a team of developers, spent $5m USD on building a team and infrastructure and created a system from scratch that enabled users to sign up for an account and build a personalised web page that contained their unique daily feed. We launched the site with Audi as a foundation direct sponsor and then the Dot Com Bubble burst. Unfortunately that combined with some potential licensing difficulties was enough to end the project there - but it was an absolute blast!