Steven R. Okun

Gold Standard Awards Chairman 2012 and Director of Public Affairs at KKR Asia Pacific

Steven R. Okun joined KKR in February 2011 as Director of Asia Pacific Public Affairs. Mr. Okun oversees public affairs, corporate citizenship and external communications and assists in those efforts for KKR's portfolio companies in the region. In addition, he serves as the Chairman of the Chairman of the Asia-Pacific Council of American Chambers of Commerce, which comprises 25 member Chambers from across the entire Asia Pacific region.

Mr. Okun served as Chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Singapore from 2008-2011, a position for which he won three consecutive elections. From 2003 - 2010, he was Vice President for Public Affairs for UPS in Asia Pacific. Mr. Okun served in the Administration of President Bill Clinton as Deputy General Counsel at the Department of Transportation.

In 2002, the National Committee on US-China Relations selected him as one of the 24 inaugural delegates to Committee's Young Leaders' Forum. In 2006, the Boao Forum for Asia chose him as the inaugural Co-Chair of the 21st Century Leaders.

Mr. Okun received his B.A. from the University of Virginia and his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law.

Asif Uddin Ahmed is Program Director of Economic Empowerment at Care Bangladesh. He is a business development specialist with nearly a decade of enterprise development experience in Bangladesh and abroad.

He specializes in business development services for micro, small and medium enterprises and corporate social responsibility.

Julia Ahmad is President of PRCA Malaysia and the Managing Director of Hill & Knowlton (SEA) Sdn Bhd in Kuala Lumpur.

She specialises in corporate and financial communications, public affairs and also provides counsel on issues and crisis management for both local and multinational clients. She has worked in the United States, Malaysia and Singapore.

Janice Armstrong is the Regional Director for Government Affairs in Asia Pacific, India and Korea for Glaxo Smith Kline. GSK is one of the world’s leading, research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies. Ms. Armstrong has worked in Asia-Pacific,China and India since 2006.

Before joining GSK in 2010, she was the Vice President of Corporate Affairs for Monsanto in AP, China and India. She has also been Monsanto’s Public Affairs Director for North and South America. Janice is a member of the Board of Governors of the American Chamber of Commerce in Singapore and the US ASEAN Business Council. She is also on the Council’s executive committee. She co-chairs the Health and Life Sciences Committee of the Council.

She holds a Bachelor of Journalism degree with Honours from Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. She has won numerous public relations society awards throughout her career and was nominated for the 2012 Public Affairs Asia Gold Standard Award for Professional Excellence.

Steven Atack is founding publisher of Public Affairs News and a specialist in international executive search and acquisition advisory in public Affairs & government relations.

He is vice president (Europe and the Russian Federation) of PublicAffairsAsia and proprietor of publicaffairsjobs.com.

Jitender Bhargava is a senior Indian corporate communicator who recently served as executive director, corporate communications of Air India. One of the country’s most prominent communicators, he joined Air India in 1989 after 12 years as head of corporate communications at Coal India Ltd.

Carolyn Brehm is Vice President for Global Government Relations for Procter & Gamble. She leads P&G’s team of government relations practitioners who support key markets in the U.S., Asia, Europe, Middle East & Africa and Latin America.

Prior to joining P&G over a decade ago, she worked in Washington, Shanghai and Hong Kong in a variety of government relations and public policy positions representing private sector, trade association and NGO interests.

Penny Burtt is the head of public affairs and external communications for McKinsey & Co in South-East Asia. She was previously, the Australian Deputy High Commissioner to Singapore.

She previously represented Australia at a senior level in Malaysia, Indonesia and at the United Nations in Geneva and New York. She has expertise in government relations, international negotiations, policy analysis and formulation, programme management, public advocacy and communications. She is a graduate of the University of Sydney.

Miles Celic is Director of Group Public Affairs and Policy at Prudential Plc. He is based in London, but takes overall responsibility for the group’s global public affairs.

He was formerly with HSBC and commenced his career in the PA consultancy arena.

Mark Chong is Associate Professor of Corporate Communication (Practice) at Singapore Management University. He is the co-editor of Winning Corporate Reputation Strategies: Lessons for Asia Pacific (McGraw-Hill) and the co-author of Brainfruit: Turning Creativity into Cash from East to West (McGraw-Hill). Prior to joining academia, he worked for close to a decade as a corporate and marketing communication practitioner in Asia. Mark received his PhD from Cornell University. Currently based in Vietnam, Tim is CARE International’s Private Sector Specialist for Asia Pacific.

His remit being to advance CARE’s efforts in engaging the private sector across the region, in a variety of partnerships and programmes addressing business responsibility and promoting inclusive growth.

Stephen Crisp is the Global Head of Policy and Public Affairs at Nokia Siemens Networks. With teams in Nokia Siemens Networks’ key geographic markets, he is responsible for leading on the company’s political, policy and regulatory issues at a global level.

Before Nokia Siemens Networks, Stephen worked with British Telecom and was appointed BT’s Director External Affairs Asia Pacific in November 2008. He established the role, leading on BT’s political and regulatory issues.

From January 2005, he was Director European Affairs for BT. Based in Brussels, he led the political and regulatory team that has responsibility for representing BT in and to the EU institutions.

Lynne Anne S. Davis is Regional President and Senior Partner of Fleishman-Hillard, overseeing its Asia Pacific operations, including 16 wholly owned offices in nine countries.

Fifteen of her over 20 years consulting with Fleishman-Hillard have been spent in Asia Pacific, where she has helped build the fastest-growing region in the firm. Public affairs is its fastest growing practice in Asia Pacific. Davis holds a journalism degree, cum laude, from the University of Missouri.

Marc-xavier Fancy joined Prudential Corporation Asia’s regional head office in March 2006 as Head of Government Relations for Asia based in Hong Kong. In his role, Marc manages the government relation activities across Prudential Corporation Asia’s businesses in the region.

Prior to joining Prudential, Marc held various positions within the financial sector both in the City of London and across Europe.

Marc graduated from the School of Oriental and African Studies, London (SOAS) with a BA in Mandarin, Bahasa Indonesia and South East Asian Studies, and speaks Mandarin, Indonesian, French and English.

Donough Foley is Head of Government and Regulatory Affairs, Asia Pacific, at Philips Electronics.

Donough has been a resident in Asia for over 20 years and has been vice president of corporate communications & Brand at Lucent Technologies and managing director, corporate practice at Burson-Marsteller.

He is a graduate of the National University of Ireland.

Stephen Forshaw holds one the the leading regional communications positions as managing director of corporate affairs at Singapore state-owned investment company, Temasek.

He was previously the corporate communications director for Microsoft in Asia and worked as VP of public affairs for Singapore Airlines. Prior to moving to Asia he was a senior adviser to a Minister in the Australian Capital Territory Government.

Maher Ghanma is the Director of DLA Piper's Global Government Relations (GGR) practice in the Middle East. An accomplished public affairs and political practitioner.

Maher previously advised the Royal Court of His Majesty King Abdullah II and Her Majesty Queen Rania Al-Abdullah acting as Middle East & Africa Policy Analyst. A Jordanian he is based in Dubai.

Sukanti Ghosh is managing director of APCO Worldwide in India. He previously served as the head of corporate affairs at Barclays Bank Plc and is based in Mumbai, India.

He was previously head of corporate communications at BankMuscat SAOG and was Vice President of Public Relations at TBWA India.

He also served as a partner at Sparsh PR and was associate director of Public Relations at Contract Advertising India Limited. He was educated at the Università della Svizzera Italiana and Jadavpur University.

Tod Gimbel is managing director and head of global government affairs, Asia at Citi. Previously he was senior director, corporate affairs, Asia Pacific Division at Levi Strauss & Co.

Prior to that he held senior positions at Vriens & Partners, Kraft Foods Global, Inc. and Altria Corporate Services. He is a graduate of Marquette University Law School, University of Miami School of Law and Lawrence University.

Yuan Haiying is president of Yuan Associates, the Beijing-based government affairs consultancy. He has over 30 years experience in the Chinese government, including senior positions in Washington DC., as China’s Agriculture Attaché, and in Rome, as the Alternate Representative to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (UNFAO). Following his government service.

Mr. Yuan served as vice president of APCO (China) and senior vice president of Edelman (China) before founding Yuan Associates in 2004.

Deborah Hayden is the president and CEO of Gavin Anderson Japan. She has nearly a quarter of a century of communications experience in Japan specializing in corporate financial communications, government and regulatory affairs.

She works with New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, advising companies entering the Japanese market. She is an adviser to the Japanese Cabinet Office.

In 2011 she was shortlisted for the PublicAffairsAsia Prospect Gold Standard Award for Professional Excellence.

Elizabeth Hernandez is Vice President, Government Affairs, Asia Pacific & Japan at Hewlett-Packard. Until 2010 she was the Director, Government and Public Affairs, Asia Pacific at GSK where she was responsible for developing and managing government and public affairs.

Prior to joining GSK, she was Regional Director of the US-ASEAN Business Council, a Washington, DC based trade association, from 2002 to 2005.

Craig Hoy is the executive director and editor of PublicAffairsAsia and the chairman of the judging panel.

A former Downing Street lobby correspondent,he was managing director of Europe’s leading political publisher Dods until 2007 and previously worked with the BBC.

An inaugural member of the Young Leaders Group which met in Washington DC in the wake of 9:11, he was educated at Edinburgh University and The City University in London.

Agnes Hui is Group Corporate Communciations Manager for Wharf Limited. She has over 16 years of experience in corporate communications dealing with public affairs, media relations, corporate social responsibility, event management and crisis communications.

She previously ran her own consulting firm the ARCH Communications and held senior positions at The Nielsen Company spearheading brand management and B2B communications. Before that she was with American Express responsible for public affairs, sponsorships and CSR programmes.

She is voluntary treasurer of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) and the Membership in-charge for the Public Relation Professional Association (PRPA) in Hong Kong.

Qun Wang Jamieson is a senior consultant with Yum! Brands Inc. China. She was previously vice president of public affairs and government relations at China Division, Yum! Brands Inc.

Previously she was senior vice president for PR and marketing at the Authosis Group. She has a BA degree from Peking University and a Masters degree from the University of California at Berkeley.

Scott Kronick is President, Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, China. An 18-year Ogilvy veteran with nine of those years spent in Beijing.

Kronick was previously Managing Director, Ogilvy PR, China. In this role, he was responsible for the leadership and management of staff in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, offices he founded for Ogilvy PR.

Diana Lin (林達瑩) is a prominent network news journalist in Hong Kong.

She is a former presenter of the news at 7.30 on TVB Pearl, and is currently host and senior executive producer of The Pearl Report, Money Magazine and Pearl Finance. Born in Hong Kong, Diana attended Diocesan Girls' School for her primary and secondary education, before going to university in the USA, majoring in English Literature then Fine Arts.

Diana has worked as a journalist in radio, magazines, newspapers and TV for more than 25 years variously based in San Francisco, Tokyo, Beijing and Hong Kong. She is a contributor and editor of the book Third World Women (San Francisco, 1972).

Terence Lyons is Managing Director of The Stakeholder Company. Based in Singapore he oversees the company’s regional and global work assisting the Fortune 500, governments and NGOs with better stakeholder solutions to connect with government and other key influencers.

Terence previously headed Microsoft’s global stakeholder engagement strategy. He holds a Bachelor of Laws from Murdoch University and is a graduate of various professional programs at the Kellogg School of Management and University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business.

He is admitted as a Barrister and Solicitor of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.

Owen Ma is the Government Affairs Director at PepsiCo in China. He is also chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Beijing’s Food Forum.

He previously worked with Eastman Kodak Company and started his career All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives. He has a Bachelor in Economics Degree from the Beijing Second Foreign Language Institute.

Ross Ma is Public Affairs Director, Greater China at The Dow Chemical Company. He is a seasoned communications professional, with over 20 years experience in both in-house and agency roles and journalism. Industry expertise includes corporate branding and reputation management, business communications, issues management, media relations, employee communications and corporate social responsibility. He has driven groundbreaking campaigns for a host of B2B firms, developing industry expertise in stakeholder management across the public affairs spectrum.

Before joining Dow, Ross was Asia Pacific regional communications director at Rohm and Haas for three years before its integration into Dow, where he has since held leadership roles for both Asia Pacific and Greater China. Prior to Rohm and Haas, he was corporate communications director at Tyco International and Boeing. Before these in-house roles, Ross held leadership positions in public relations firms Burson-Marsteller and Edelman, where he serviced clients from multiple industries, once winning an “Agency of the Year in Asia” award for recognition in excellence in marketing communications.

Ross began his career as a journalist at China Daily and during his seven-year tenure was an award-winning and often-quoted source for national politics, business, and defense columns. He was also a feature writer on culture and also sub-editor for the day desk and features. Ross earned an MBA from Queensland University of Technology, Australia; a degree in mass communications from the University of Hawaii, US; and, a degree in English and Journalism from Shanghai International Studies University, China. Ross and his family reside in Shanghai, China.

Dr. Simeon Mellalieu is General Manager, Ketchum Hong Kong. A corporate communications specialist, his expertise lies in corporate positioning and reputation management, brand building, issues and crisis management, corporate social responsibility, broadcast media relations and sponsorship.

Simeon is currently the Chairman of the Council of PR Firms of Hong Kong.

Mark Michelson is senior counselor at APCO Worldwide and chairman of IMA Asia's CEO Forum in Hong Kong. He also is an adjunct associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and a member of the Fulbright Advisory Committee.

Dr. Michelson has worked on government relations and communication projects involving most governments in the Asia-Pacific region and the United States for over 35 years. From 2004 through 2008, he was Associate Director-General for Investment Promotion at Invest Hong Kong, the investment promotion department of the Hong Kong Government.

Dr. Michelson earned his Bachelor of Arts from Carleton College and his doctorate from the University of Illinois in Japanese studies.

Paul Mottram is Executive Vice President, Asia Pacific, at Bite Communications, which was formerly Upstream Asia. Based in Hong Kong. was previously Chief Executive Officer of Gorilla Asia, which merged with Upstream Asia in June 2001. At Gorilla.

Paul oversaw all aspects of its business, including conferences, special events and online content.

Junie Del Mundo is the CEO of EON The Stakeholder Relations Firm. Under his leadership, EON is regarded as the pioneering stakeholder relations firm that puts TRUST at the heart of its collaborations and dialogues with different stakeholders of its clients.

He is a prolific speaker in business discussions hosted by various business chambers and clubs, such as the ECCP, ANZCHAM, AMCHAM, MBC, and MAP where he shares insights on reputation management, CSR Communications and other vital topics. In 2010, he was a finalist for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of Year Awards. For 2011, he chairs the MAP CSR Committee;
He is also the chairperson of the 18th National PR Congress of the Public Relations Society of the Philippines.

Prior to establishing EON, Junie was a career diplomat for 13 years and served at the Philippine Embassies in Paris, France; Dakar, Senegal; and at the Philippine Mission for UNESCO in Paris. He represented the Philippines in multinational fora such as UNESCO, ASEAN, APEC, and Asia-Europe Business Forum.

Alistair Nicholas is Executive Vice President of Public Affairs at Weber Shandwick in Asia Pacific.

He is responsible for Weber Shandwick's reputation management and public affairs business in China and also leads the firm's regional Public Affairs practice across Asia Pacific. He previously served as president and CEO of AC Capital Strategic Consulting, which he founded in 2003.

Prior to that he headed up Edelman’s Beijing office. Immediately before moving to China he was Australia’s Trade Commissioner to Washington D.C. Earlier in his career Alistair worked in journalism, public relations and political advisory roles in Australia.

Kirstie Nicholson is a founder and managing director of Landmark Asia. She has extensive experience of advising a wide range of clients on legal and regulatory issues, and has worked in Brussels, London, Shanghai and Singapore.

Prior to joining Landmark Asia, Kirstie was responsible for developing the Asian competition law practice of an international law firm. Kirstie was named as a leading competition lawyer in China in Chambers Asia 2009, and has been widely quoted in the international media (including the Financial Times) on issues relating to competition policy and regulation in China.

Mark O'Brien is the vice president of PublicAffairsAsia with responsibility for the Asia Pacific region. He previously held senior public affairs roles in the forest products and express delivery sector.

He is a graduate of the University of St. Andrews.

Bev Postma is originally from the UK and has been Executive Director of Food Industry Asia since July 2010.

A seasoned corporate affairs specialist with more than 15 years in the agri-food sector, she has worked with the food industry across Europe and Asia.

Before joining FIA, Bev held corporate affairs roles at Syngenta in Asia, Kellogg’s in Europe and the UK National Farmers’ Union in London and Brussels. She has been at the forefront of many noteworthy projects, including the launch of the ‘Red Tractor’ quality mark on British Food, the promotion of self-regulatory codes on food labelling in Europe, and the introduction of anti-counterfeiting campaigns in various ASEAN countries.

Andy Roby is a former UK government official who was CSR adviser to the Timber Trade Federation in London. He now acts as an EU adviser promoting sustainable forestry in Indonesia.

Anthony Rose leads the Corporate Affairs function for Walmart Asia, based in Hong Kong. Prior to joining Walmart in 2010, Anthony held a range of Corporate Affairs and Influencer Marketing roles across Asia and North America with Procter & Gamble, Clea PR, Glaxo (now GSK) and the Datamatics Group. Anthony’s experience of over 21 years spans every aspect of Corporate Affairs and Influencer Marketing.

He is credited with several breakthroughs in Communications including his blueprint vision for the Future of Influencer Marketing in 2005, which became the basis of P&G’s capability building in that area.Anthony loves to give back to the industry and the community. He is Co-Chair of the ECR Asia Pacific Executive Council, past professor for eight years at the Xavier Institute of Communications. His latest business/self-help book “Daddy’s Logic” (all his proceeds from this book to charity) is in stores across Asia in August 2012. Anthony holds a Masters Degree in Geology and post graduate qualification in Mass Communications from St Xavier’s College, Mumbai, India and the Xavier Institute of Communications, India, respectively.

Marc Ross is the director of communications and publications for the US-China Business Council (USCBC) where he directs USCBC's global communications, marketing, and media efforts. USCBC is a private, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization of nearly 240 American companies that do business with China and is the leading American organization focused on US-China commercial relations.

Ross holds a Master of Business Administration with an emphasis on global business and international relations through the University of North Carolina’s OneMBA program at the Kenan-Flagler Business School and a Bachelor of Liberal Studies from Bowling Green State University.

Mark Runacres is former UK Deputy High Commissioner to India and an independent public affairs consultant.

He served for 25 years in the British Diplomatic Service where he gained experience in international trade and investment, international security, development and political analysis.

John Russell is founder and managing director of North Head, a Beijing-based public affairs and communications consultancy.

He was previously executive vice president of Weber Shandwick and is responsible for the corporate communications and public affairs practices in the Asia Pacific region. He has extensive experience gained in Europe and Asia Pacific.

He spent 10 years as the executive director of the American Chamber of Commerce to the European Union before moving to Weber Shandwick in 1999 to head up its Brussels office.

Kumi Sato is the CEO and President of the Cosmo Public Relations Corporation, one of Japan’s largest independent communications consultancies, specializing in healthcare and food science. She has won numerous awards including Stateswoman of the Year by Harvard Business School and part of the Forbes “50 Leading Women Entrepreneurs of the World.”

She has been the Chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan and a former management professor at Kenichi Ohmae Graduate School of Business. She was the 2011 recipient of the PublicAffairsAsia Prospect Gold Standard Award for Professional Excellence.

Christian Schubert is vice president of corporate communications with Asia Pacific at BASF.

He was previously director of corporate communicatons with the BASF Group. He was head of media relations at DaimlerChrysler Financial Services AG and manager of corporate strategy at Daimler-Benz InterServices (debis) AG.

He was a desk officer at the economics department at the German Foreign Office and is a graduate of the Technische Universität Berlin.

Dr. Thavirap Tantiwongse is Public Affairs Director at GlaxoSmithKline, the global pharmaceutical company.

He is based in Bangkok, Thailand and is responsible for all areas of public affairs including government affairs, corporate and internal communications, media and external relations, community partnership, and health economics. He is a graduate of London and Cambridge Universities in physiology and medicine.

Rakesh Thukral is Director - Public Affairs and Advocacy at Edelman in India. He has over 20 years of experience in public relations, public affairs and strategic communications.

At Edelman, he provides senior counsel to the corporate practice team in Delhi and leads the firm’s Public Affairs practice in India.

Thanh Vu joined the US-ASEAN Business Council as its first Vietnam Representative in late 2007 when the Council opened its Hanoi office.

In this capacity, he advises the world’s leading multinational companies on business strategies in Vietnam and helps them engage directly with leaders of the government of Vietnam and its ruling party. Prior to this.

Thanh had worked in various capacities in Vietnam’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs including Information and Outreach Manager for APEC 2006 Vietnam, as a member of the National APEC Organizing Committee, and Research Fellow and Teaching Staff at the Institute for International Relations in Hanoi.

Joe Welch is senior vice president of government relations, Asia at News Corporation and previously held a similar role at Star TV. He was previously regional director of regulatory affairs (Asia) at MCI.

He is based in Hong Kong was educated at Santa Clara University School of Law and Amherst College.

Dato Dr. Michael O.K. Yeoh is Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Asian Strategy & Leadership Institute (ASLI) and Secretary-General of the Malaysia-China Business Council and the ASEAN Business Forum.

He is Co-Chairman of the ASEAN Leadership Forum. He was recently appointed by the Prime Minister and Government of Malaysia to be Malaysia’s Representative on the new ASEAN High Level Task Force which was announced by the ASEAN Heads of States and Governments to develop ASEAN Connectivity focusing on ICT, Education, Human Capital Development, Transport, Power and Energy.

Kuek Yu-Chuang is the regional director of public policy at Yahoo! Asia Pacific. He has worked for the Ministry of Law and Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He represented Singapore as a political secretary at the Singapore Embassy in Washington D.C.

He also served on the China Desk at the Ministry headquarters. Kuek represents Yahoo! as a director on the board of the US-ASEAN Business Council and the Asia Internet Coalition.

He holds a Master of Arts in Regional Studies, East Asia from Harvard University and a Bachelor of Arts in International Politics from Peking University.

Lionel Zetter is an author on lobbying and public affairs. He is a vice president of PublicAffairsAsia, a director of the Enterprise Forum, and a member of the Executive Board of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.

Based in London, he is former president of the CIPR, a former Chairman of the Government Affairs Group, and is currently a consultant to a wide variety of PA and PR related bodies.