Mindshare China president Melvyn Goh resigns

Goh (pictured) has resigned due to personal reasons and has not revealed plans for his next career move.

The agency is now searching for a new president for Mindshare Greater China region.

In the interim, Linda Lin, vice-president of Mindshare China, and Karl Cluck, chief strategy officer of Mindshare China, will continue as co-presidents to oversee the management of Mindshare China, working directly with Bessie Lee, CEO of GroupM China, and Ashutosh Srivastava. chairman and CEO of Mindshare global emerging markets group.

Rumours about Goh’s resignation have been circulating for some time. When Campaign Asia-Pacific asked GroupM about the rumours in mid-June, a spokesperson reported that Goh was on sabbatical leave as he was feeling ‘burnt out’.

Goh took the president role at Mindshare in May 2010, where he was responsible for strategic and operational growth of the agency.

Prior to joining Mindshare, he was CEO of M Media Group, a media investment unit of Morningside Group, from 2005 to 2010.

Lee said, “on behalf of Mindshare and GroupM China, I wish Melvyn much success in his new endeavors.”

One former 4A agency boss commented that "Melvin has worked in media owner side. It is not easy to survive in agency as they have very different culture."

A recent similar departure of senior agency head with a non-agency background was Li Yifei, former chief strategic development officer for Publicis. Li was a senior advisor at GLG Partners before joining Vivaki China as country chair in 2009, but she resigned in November 2011 and has joined London-listed investment management firm, the Man Group.