INVNT is rapidly expanding in APAC

It’s already been a big year for INVNT in Asia-Pacific with the opening of a Singapore office in January, the launch of new branded content division HEVE shortly after, and the appointment of creative powerhouse Adam Harriden as executive creative director for the region
in March.

And all this comes within 18 months of its APAC launch with the Sydney office in October 2017. APAC managing director Laura Roberts says it has been “fast and furious” with the Singapore office opening well ahead of schedule.

“We weren’t really anticipating opening in Singapore for probably another year, but the demand was there and our existing clients – some based in Australia, some based in Singapore – asked us to move into Singapore to help support their projects across the region,” she says.

“The plan for Singapore is to build it out with full-time talent as well as expand our freelance network across the region. Already we’re producing events in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan. And I think China will come into play pretty soon.”

While the plan for now is to service existing clients out of the Singapore headquarters, Roberts doesn’t rule out further offices as “every day is evolving and changing”. But Asia-Pacific’s talent shortage is no secret – so how does INVNT plan to support this expansion?

“We’re a true global agency so all of our offices are not siloed, we share resources,” she says. “A brief that comes in could be staffed with designers out of Sweden, creative directors out of New York, and then backed up with our local producers.”

And will APAC clients have access to NYC-headquartered HEVE? “Most of our clients are global brands, so we’ll be looking for opportunities to develop globally relevant, locally calibrated stories in a time when we have the ability to push branded content out to a global audience,” says Roberts.

“It’s a brand-new division, but we now have the ability to produce video content and deploy it anywhere in the world.”