The appointment of Lincoln Damen as Regional Executive Creative Director completes Carbon’s leadership

25 May, 2023

Carbon has recently assembled a complete regional leadership team as part of its long-term strategy for growth. Tereza Tan, the Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Carbon, emphasizes the importance of having the right individuals leading the agency in order to deliver their value proposition to the market.

​​Originally established as a motion design and live-action production studio, Carbon has evolved into an end-to-end creative content agency. We collaborate with domestic and international brands to create unique and immersive content across their brand ecosystems.

Strength in numbers

To support Carbon’s long-term growth trajectory, strategic hires have been made to form the new senior leadership team.

The latest addition to the team is Lincoln Damen, who joins as the Regional Executive Creative Director. In this role, Damen will oversee Carbon’s entire creative capability. With extensive experience as a Creative Director in “big agency” environments, Damen has served regional and global markets with agencies such as TBWA (Shanghai) and Imagination (Hong Kong).

Damen expressed his excitement about joining Carbon, stating, “Having long admired Carbon’s work, I am excited to play a role in further elevating the already very high standards of creativity here. Carbon has always been that rare breed of agency that truly embodies their creative strength not only in their storytelling but also through exceptional craft. As a team and business, we will be heavily focused on expanding and diversifying our creative offering through the adoption and integration of new creative innovations and emerging technologies – VR, anamorphic display, holographic, interactive experiential and beyond. There are endless opportunities to create uniquely engaging content experiences for brands and their customers.”

Damen will be leading a team that includes Clara Ho, previously of Grey Hong Kong, as HK Group Creative Director; Stratos Efstahiou as HK Creative Director, who recently joined from Ogilvy Hong Kong; and highly awarded filmmaker and Creative Director Ahmad Saleh, who joins the Singapore office from TBWA.

Key commercial positions have also been confirmed, with Angie Akaraskul appointed as Business Director for Singapore, and Kelly Chin promoted to Business Director of the Hong Kong office earlier this year. Akaraskul brings valuable experience from her time at Dentsu and smaller agencies such as Culture Group, while Chin has been with Carbon since 2016.

The new leadership team will report to Founder Tereza Tan and Group Managing Director Damien Bell. Bell emphasizes that the selection of the team members was done with great care and attention, seeking not only leaders but also pillars of the business, inspirational mentors, and individuals who will collectively lead Carbon into a new chapter while building upon the existing foundations.

Bell elaborates, “Individually, our leaders bring a diverse array of expertise and skills to the business, but what unifies this team is shared values: ambition and striving for excellence in everything we do.”

Carbon’s wheels are in motion

Founded by Tan in 2004, Carbon initially operated as a production studio that supported network agencies in film, VFX, and motion graphics production. However, in recent years, the company shifted its focus to directly support brands, bridging the gap between advertising agencies and small production shops. Carbon now combines its technical design and production capabilities with a team of highly skilled and agency-trained storytellers and creative thinkers to offer comprehensive content solutions.

According to Bell, Carbon is driven by meeting a specific client need: “On one level, we operate like major advertising agencies, where we excel in storytelling and approach every concept with a brand-centric and insights-led approach. But we are also creators, and our technical expertise allows us to bring those stories to life through meticulously crafted and scalable content. Brands increasingly want the high-level creative thinking that larger agencies are famed for but creative output that comes with an agility and price point that smaller agencies are able to provide. That’s our play.”