VICE Media hires Serene Lee as APAC sales lead to build commercial team in SG

VICE Media, a global youth media brand has appointed Serene Lee (pictured) as VICE Asia Pacific head of sales, in tandem with its expansion plans across Asia Pacific. Lee will be working closely with VICE’s existing commercial teams across North Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia/New Zealand and India and will establish a commercial team in Singapore. She aims to expand VICE’s commercial footprint across all markets.Lee will be working with VICE Asia Pacific CEO Hosi Simon in Singapore.She brings with her 23 years of sales, marketing and management experience. She previously helmed the role of a senior vice president of Forbes Asia. Through her role, she oversaw growth in the Thailand and Malaysia markets and was responsible for creating integrated campaigns.Prior to joining Forbes, Lee was assistant vice president and co-brand cards head for Citigroup Singapore and also worked as regional account manager at AXN Asia and Asiaweek.“I’m very excited to be part of VICE and its expansion into APAC. This is a fast-growing and dynamic region with an increasingly digitally-savvy youth population — and there is immense potential for VICE to bring something different to meet both client and audience needs. I’m looking forward to working with this fantastic team to increase our presence and offering across all platforms and all APAC territories — essentially being everywhere young people are, in the formats they love,” Lee said.Simon has described Lee as having "genuine cultural and business understanding" that VICE is looking for."In her work to date, Lee has shown she’s a brilliant leader and someone who creates business and brand-defining opportunities. We believe there’s a huge opportunity for VICE to build out a deeply relevant, highly local, youth media company across Asia Pacific and she is going to play a significant role in helping us do just that,” he added.The recent launch of VICE India, in partnership with Times of India Group, has brought the full suite of VICE offerings, alongside operations in Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan. According to the release, VICE has plans for partnerships and hiring of creative, content and commercial talent across all regions.