Digital Media Asia Awards, hackathon and conference drive innovation in news media

October 20, 2014

WAN-IFRA’s rolling series of global digital media events will come to Asia in November when Digital Media Asia 2014 brings publishers and editors together with hackers, designers, producers and other new media professionals to explore the latest trends in social media, content monetisation, mobile, data and digital advertising.

With sister conferences in Europe, India and Latin America, Digital Media Asia will take place in Singapore from November 18 to 21. It will feature the industry’s leading digital experts and showcase how cutting edge media organisations are using advanced digital platforms to attract large audiences and generate significant revenue with news content.

Launched in 2009, Digital Media Asia is Asia’s largest digital conference for news media. It is organised by the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA). Further details can be found at http://www.wan-ifra.org/dma

Speakers include:

Marc Lourdes, Managing Editor (SEA) of Yahoo! News Digest, who will explain how the app is produced by teams in the US and Europe to ensure seamless and continuous coverage of international news events, as well as with marketing and communication teams to promote the app and inform the public.

Kalle Jungvist, Special Advisor to Schisted's CEO, contributes to the design of the Scandinavian media group online and mobile strategy. Schisted is one of the rare media companies to generate over 50% of it revenues from digital. Kalle will present at DMA case studies on mobile and Web TV monetisation.

Julian Tan is the Head of Singapore Press Holding (SPH)’s newly formed Digital Division. With over 18 years of media and digital experience, especially in building new ventures, Julian will present SPH Digital's top priorities for the strategic growth of its online and mobile businesses.

Alice Ting, VP Licensing and Syndication at The New York Times, is responsible for the financial performance of brand extension, licensing and syndication businesses globally. She will explain how the Times designs, implements and monetises digital brand extension products and services.

Amit Garg is Business Head - Digital at HT Media, where he oversees the group’s digital investments. In 2013, HT Media acquired the social media agency Webitude to offer digital solutions that leverage the combined power of mobile and social media under the umbrella brand Digital Quotient.

Pierre Flitsch is Head of the Digital Performance Unit at Styria Digital, where he is responsible for the online traffic of the Styria Media Group, which attracts more than 22 million unique visitors in Austria, Slovenia and Croatia. Big Data is the pillar of his strategy.

Joey Chung is the Co-Founder and CEO of the Chinese language, Hong Kong-based The News Lens, one of the fastest growing digital news sites in Asia. Prior to starting The News Lens in mid-2013, Joey was with the Japanese multinational character & media company Sanrio in California, before being sent to Shanghai as president of its China operations.

Hildeguun Soldal is Digital Editor at Dagbladet, Norway’s second largest tabloid newspaper. She also heads the newspaper's digital development team and works on the digital strategy across all platforms. Hildeguun was previously with the Guardian for 9 years and part of the team who redesigned guardian.co.uk in 2008.

The winners of the Asian Digital Media Awards 2014 will be presented at the conference in eight categories: News Website, Multimedia Campaign, Online Video, Data Visualisation Project, Mobile Service, Tablet Publishing, Reader Engagement, Outstanding New Product.

Digital Media Asia will also feature, on 14 to 16 November, the winning solutions produced at DMA.Hack 2014, a hackathon focused on digital media innovation organised by WAN-IFRA with the support of Newsplex Asia, a joint training venture by WAN-IFRA and the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information on the campus of Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore. Presented by SPH Digital, DMA.Hack aims to uncover tomorrow’s apps that will reinvent ways of discovering, telling, editing, producing and sharing content. More information is available at: http://dmahack.wan-ifra.org

Other confirmed speakers #DMAsg14 include:

- Fabrizio Lo Cicero, VP Asia Pacific, News Republic, China
- Le Quoc Minh, Editor in Chief, Vietnam News Agency, Vietnam
- Grig Davidovitz, CEO, RGB Media, Israel
- Gregor Waller, Principal Consultant, WAN-IFRA Consulting
- Javier Vicente D. Rufino, Director for Mobile & Books, Philippine Daily Inquirer
- Robb Montgomery, CEO, Montgomery Multimedia , USA
- Kim Svendsen, Director, Stibo Accelerator, Denmark
- Russel Shepherd, Chief Data Scientist, Rappler, Philippines
- William Lee, ‎Senior VP, Digital Business and Technology, MediaCorp, Singapore
- Asha Philips, Founder, Verily, Vietnam
- Jeremy Wagstaff, Chief Technology Correspondent, Asia, Thomson Reuters
- Deepika Nikhilender, CEO GEMS, Mindshare, Singapore
- Christina Lo Man Ki, Editor in Chief, Apple Daily, Hong Kong
- Simon Carr, Deputy Head of Graphics, Thomson Reuters

WAN-IFRA, based in Paris, France, and Frankfurt, Germany, with subsidiaries in Singapore, India and Latin America, is the global organisation of the world’s newspapers and news publishers. It represents more than 18,000 publications, 15,000 online sites and over 3,000 companies in more than 120 countries. Its core mission is to defend and promote press freedom, quality journalism and the development of prosperous media businesses.

Inquiries to: WAN-IFRA Asia Pacific Pte Ltd, 25 International Business Park, 04-110, German Centre, 609916 Singapore. tel: +65 65628440. E-mail: wilson.leong@wan-ifra.org

For more information contact:
Larry Kilman
Secretary General
WAN-IFRA
Phone: 33-147428507
Email: larry.kilman@wan-ifra.org
Website: www.wan-ifra.org/