Markus Castro
Tokyo—March 17, 2022—Hakuhodo DY Holdings today announced that it is partnering with GrabAds, Grab’s advertising business unit, to help clients harness the power of omni-channel marketing through Grab’s solutions. Both companies plan to work together to co-develop meaningful and innovative online-to-offline (O2O) campaigns to better engage consumers in Southeast Asia.
Grab is a leading superapp for deliveries, mobility, and financial services in Southeast Asia. The multi-year collaboration will enable Hakuhodo DY Group companies’ clients to leverage GrabAds’ first-party data insights into changing Southeast Asian sei-katsu-sha tastes and behaviors, as well as its superapp advertising expertise in driving full-funnel conversion via GrabCar, GrabFood, GrabMart and GrabPay.
Since 2018, Hakuhodo DY Group companies and GrabAds have jointly developed several award-winning superapp campaigns that showcase the power of combining massive online reach with powerful offline brand experiences. This collaboration helped the client clinch prestigious awards, such as Best Omni-Channel Campaign in APAC at The Drum Awards for Digital Advertising 2021, PR Award Grand Prix, MMA Smarties APAC and so on.
Masato Aoki, Corporate Officer at Hakuhodo DY Holdings Inc. said:
“Hakuhodo DY Group and Grab Group have been supporting clients’ advertising and marketing activities, and executing R&D activities and PoC (Proof-of-Concept) projects for innovative solutions from 2018.
We are very pleased to be the first Japanese advertising company to sign a regional multi-year partnership with Grab. According to a recent survey, 80% of Southeast Asia’s senior marketers are planning to increase ads distribution on the Superapp platforms in 2022. We are confident that this partnership will contribute to the growth of both groups in the business domains of marketing service and advertising.
Hakuhodo DY Group’ will do its best to serve as a bridge and a window between Southeast Asian communities, companies, and people and those in Japan.”
Ken Mandel, Regional Managing Director and Head of GrabAds and Brand Insights, said:
“Hakuhodo DY Holdings emphasizes the importance of a 360-degree perspective on consumers’ lives. Sei-katsu-sha Insight is the foundation of the company’s brand building philosophy. It reminds us that consumers are more than shoppers performing an economic function. They have heartbeats and distinct tastes and lifestyles. We are delighted to be teaming up to help Hakuhodo DY Group’s clients more deeply understand superlocal behaviors, trends and tastes across Southeast Asia and harness the power of superapp advertising to accelerate omni-channel marketing in this region.”
About Grab
Grab is Southeast Asia’s leading superapp based on GMV in 2021 in each of food deliveries, mobility and the e-wallets segment of financial services, according to Euromonitor. Grab operates across the deliveries, mobility and digital financial services sectors in 480 cities in eight countries in the Southeast Asia region – Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Grab enables millions of people each day to access its driver- and merchant-partners to order food or groceries, send packages, hail a ride or taxi, pay for online purchases or access services such as lending, insurance, wealth management and telemedicine, all through a single “everyday everything” app. Grab was founded in 2012 with the mission to drive Southeast Asia forward by creating economic empowerment for everyone, and since then, the Grab app has been downloaded onto millions of mobile devices. Grab strives to serve a double bottom line: to simultaneously deliver financial performance for its shareholders and a positive social impact in Southeast Asia.
About Hakuhodo DY Holdings
Hakuhodo DY Holdings Inc. is a marketing services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It was formed in 2003 when its core brand agencies Hakuhodo Inc. (founded 1895), Daiko Advertising Inc. (founded 1944), and Yomiko Advertising Inc. (founded 1946) integrated and created a joint holding company (“DY” represents the initial letters of Daiko and Yomiko, respectively).
The Hakuhodo DY Group comprises seven distinct groups: The Group’s integrated advertising companies Hakuhodo, Daiko, and Yomiko; the next-generation digital agency IREP; the integrated media company Hakuhodo DY Media Partners; D.A.Consortium; and the strategic operating unit kyu.
The Group consists of 415 subsidiaries and affiliates, with a combined total of over 24,000 employees working in 21 countries and regions. Ad Age ranked it at No. 12 in its most recent annual ranking of the world’s largest agency companies.
Sei-katsu-sha Insight, the centerpiece of the Hakuhodo DY Group’s philosophy, is the foundation for the Group’s thinking, planning, and brand building. It recognizes that people are not just consumers performing an economic function, but rather individuals with distinct lifestyles, aspirations, and dreams. They are sei-katsu-sha, or “people with lives.” Hakuhodo introduced this term in the 1980s to emphasize its commitment to a comprehensive, 360-degree, perspective on peoples’ lives.
Renowned for its creativity, the Hakuhodo DY Group has won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity multiple times.
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