Asian Youth; A tidal wave of new consumers- their media habits and buying potential.

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Speaker: Alan Rambam, Senior Vice President and Partner, Fleishman-Hillard New York

Time: 8 – 9:45am

Location: Mandarin Oriental, New York. 80 Columbus Circle, at 60th Street.
Lotus Suite, 36th Floor. (Enter the hotel lobby at 60th Street, off Broadway)

For decades the United States was the world's only significant mass and one of the top three luxury markets, offering businesses more than enough consumers to buy up ever greater volumes of their merchandise and services. To gain access to all these consumers, companies had to operate inside the country. They could do so very profitably because they benefited from economies of scale, meaning that each item coming off an assembly line was less expensive to produce than the one before.

The wealth generated, in profits and wages, has made the United States far and away the world's most powerful nation for nearly a century. No one else had ever been able to match the American achievement. But now the world is witnessing the birth of a mass market and emerging luxury market in China whose 1.3 billion people hold the promise of consumption on a much greater scale than in the United States.

China's share of the world's output of goods and services has nearly doubled since 1991, to 12.7 percent, closing in on the European Union's 15.7 percent and approaching
America's 21 percent, according to the international monetary fund. No other nation comes close to China's explosive expansion, all of it generating purchasing power for a rapidly growing work force. India has increased its share by 33 percent since 1991, but still accounts for a meager 4.8 percent of total global output. The American share, although clearly the largest, has not changed since 1980.

As China's economy grows and opens further the opportunity it presents to multinationals is changing dramatically. Foreign companies are moving to country development and new strategic choices. In this context, Asian youth represent an emerging market that must be on the radar of luxury marketers. Fleishman-Hillard has recently completed a series of research studies focused on the media consumption habits of teens and young adults in Tokyo, India, Korea, Hong Kong, and Shanghai.

Alan Rambam, Senior Vice President and Senior Partner at Fleishman-Hillard, will present the results of these studies and the implications for luxury marketers going forward.

Asian Youth

Asian youth are rapidly moving away from traditional television ads and beginning to rely more on online and wireless media. Alan will discuss emerging youth online and wireless trends, communication habits, and unique models that all companies must consider to engage and motivate this new generation.

Marketers estimate that China's youth will become the most powerful consumer force in the world within the next twenty years and India isn't far behind as half of their population is under the age of 25. Given the levels of education today among Asian youth, and their activity rates, this audience will have a tremendous impact on the direction that media consumption and advertising take worldwide.

Young urban Chinese teens are the most in tune with their counterparts around the world. They are concentrated in the biggest cities and are the most brand-conscious and open to foreign brands. It is no surprise that these more-sophisticated "city kids" go online more than twice as much as youth in rural areas. The Internet is the main source of news and product information for these teens.

Chinese teens and young adults are the most committed and driven gamers on the planet. The market for fantasy and adventure multiple role-playing games increased 54% in 2005, and is on track to reach $2.1 billion by end of the decade. China is expected to surpass South Korea this year to become Asia's biggest gaming market.

It is unclear if the PC will continue as the dominant platform that youth use to access the Internet, as over 90% of all households in the major East Asian markets now own at least one cell phone. The Asia-Pacific wireless telecom industry will grow by more than 50% in the next five years. Young people are at the forefront of the evolution of this medium and their usage habits will dictate the types of media, products, entertainment options, and platforms that will be available all across Asia.

Alan will talk about how;

-Chinese teens today are yearning for individual self-expression and this is already helping to define the types of user-generated content (UGC) platforms that are being developed for them. We will take a deep dive into these sites and project how they will change over the next decade.

-The online gender shift in Asia has been more rapid than any other part of the world as young women are the now the fastest growing segment of Asian Internet users. What does this mean for the types of online web sites and content platforms that will be popular?

-With the functionality and quality of music playing on mobile phones now greatly enhanced, and the availability of mobile digital broadcasting, TV phones and wireless broadband connectivity the role of the wireless handset has greatly expanded. We will look at exactly what young people are doing with their handsets today and where this will go in the future.

-What recent deregulation of the TV industry means for Chinese youth media consumption and will this carry over into the online environment.

About Alan Rambam

Alan Rambam is currently a senior vice president and partner for Fleishman-Hillard, where he is developing and managing NGT (Next Great Thing), the agency’s proprietary “R & D” department built on a media-neutral approach to distribute information across multiple consumer touch-points. This global marketing group is responsible for preparing the agency and its clients to better understand and embrace the new media paradigm straddling the online, offline, and wireless world of today’s consumers. In addition to his work on NGT, Mr. Rambam also oversees the agency’s youth marketing practice and all of the strategic planning and execution of Cingular Wireless’ youth marketing efforts.

Before joining Fleishman-Hillard, Mr. Rambam started the youth marketing firm Zoot Suit, and in just three years, he grew the agency from a single proprietorship into a multimillion-dollar agency with a client base that included Crayola, Tommy Hilfiger, and Toys ‘R Us. The agency was acquired in its fourth year by Gillespie/McCann Erickson (Interpublic).

During the Clinton Administration, Mr. Rambam was appointed as the director for the National Youth Campaign for the White House’s National Campaign Against Youth Violence (NCAYV). The campaign was created to develop a comprehensive national strategy and harness private and governmental resources to address the issue of youth violence. In his role, Mr. Rambam was responsible for personally communicating with and engaging a number of the NCAYV’s board members including Steve Case (AOL), Mel Karmazin (CBS/Viacom), and Robert Iger (Disney/ABC) in the activities of the campaign.

Mr. Rambam also founded the nonprofit organization SHiNE to use his marketing acumen, management skills, and contacts to ensure that the world will be a better place for all young people. In just three years, Mr. Rambam secured $6 million in youth cause-marketing partnerships/sponsorships and $30 million in media for this start-up organization from the icons of today’s youth segment including Procter & Gamble, Kodak, Levi’s, AOL Time Warner, MTV, and Nintendo. Under Mr. Rambam’s leadership, the organization garnered an “A” list of celebrity supporters that includes Muhammad Ali, Kevin Spacey, Susan Sarandon, Mandy Moore, Russell Simmons, and Sean “PDiddy” Combs.

Mr. Rambam has a dual degree in marketing and journalism from Temple University and is widely recognized as a leading youth culture and lifestyle marketing visionary.

In 2002 Alan received the Theodor Herzl Award from the State of Israel for his outstanding humanitarian efforts. In doing so, he joined a prestigious list of past award recipients including Michael Milken, Margaret Thatcher, and Ted Turner. Mr. Rambam also devotes his talent and energies by serving on the board of directors of Echo Pro-social Gallery, and assists with numerous regional and national charities and cultural organizations.