Akimasa Baba

Starting his career at Dentsu as a Strategic Planner after graduating from the University of Tokyo in 1987, Akimasa subsequently graduated from the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Southern California, with a Master of Arts in Communication Management.

He returned to Tokyo in 1993 to pursue his career at Dentsu, and as Research Director and Senior Consultant at the Dentsu Institute, was engaged in variety of special assignments such as Dentsu R&D projects, IT strategy, consulting projects for media companies/conglomerates, and some government projects.

In May 2003 Akimasa was appointed as COO of a newly established media agency named Media Palette (Thailand) Ltd. which grew rapidly and in May 2007 was rebranded as Dentsu Media (Thailand) Ltd.  As its newly promoted CEO, he took the strategic initiative in providing unique/exclusive media value to clients.  By fully utilizing Dentsu's expertise and resources, he originated a variety of unique content-related projects such as the live telecast of Euro 2004 (2004 UEFA European Football Championship) in Thailand, quality TV program licensing from Japan, local TV program development by utilizing program formats from Japan and partnering with TV producers, and a joint sport project with the National Olympic Committee of Thailand.

After establishing a strong market position for Dentsu Media (Thailand) and its 3 divisions, Media Palette, Media Cubic and Media Matrix, Akimasa left Thailand in February 2011 to become GM of Dentsu Media HQ in Tokyo.  Currently he oversees Dentsu's overseas media and digital business as the head of the Global Media & Digital Business Office.  Since Dentsu's new CEO Ishii believes that Dentsu's global strategy is the key to its future, Akimasa is also assigned as Deputy Director of Corporate Strategy Division, developing global strategy.