Brand Finance Global Forum 2021 - Global vs Local Brands

David is the Chairman of Brand Finance Plc – the world’s leading brand valuation consultancy. He has worked in the area of branded business, brand, and intangible asset valuation since 1991. He specialised entirely in the field after becoming the Director of Brand Valuation for Interbrand in 1995. He subsequently left Interbrand in 1996 to launch Brand Finance which is celebrating 25 years in business this year.

David represented the British Standards Institution in the working parties responsible for crafting international industry standards: ISO 10668 on Brand Valuation in 2010 and ISO 20671 on Brand Evaluation in 2019.

David is a passionate writer and has authored many articles on brand valuation, published in numerous marketing and finance newspapers and magazines, such as: Financial Times, Accountancy Age, and Marketing Week. He has also lectured on the topic of brand valuation for Harvard, Chicago, and London Business Schools.

David graduated from Bristol University with an English degree, qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Price Waterhouse in London, and obtained a postgraduate diploma in Marketing from the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM). He is a Fellow of The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) and has a practising certificate with the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW).

Dagmara joined the International Advertising Association (IAA) in 2017 as the Global Executive Director in charge of overseeing the IAA business across 56 countries. As a global leader in the marketing and communications industry, she believes social and environmental responsibility are as important as profit. She has used this belief system to transform the IAA brand and it's culture over the last 4 years.

Prior to joining IAA, Dagmara was the President and Founder of Dagmara Szulce LLC, a marketing services consultancy focused on partnering with CMOs and CEOs in the luxury, fashion, beauty, real estate and private equity sectors to build purpose-driven brands.

Dagmara has a 22 year track record building & transforming category leading brands globally and in the US.  She has unique expertise in crafting living brand ecosystems with a key objective of igniting ongoing consumer desire and irrational loyalty. Her Clients included: P&G, Unilever, Pfizer, Frederic Fekkai, Nespresso, Estee Lauder, Ralph Lauren, Taylor Swift Fragrance, The Diamond Trading Company/DeBeers, Steinway & Sons, The Corcoran Real Estate Group, Roberta Roller Rabbit.

She is a board member at ACT Responsible, MBA teacher at Baruch College, speaker and advisor to CMOs/CEOs.

Mehul Kapadia combines his passion for technology and sports in the range of business roles in his career. Currently Mehul is the Global Head of Marketing, MNC & Corporate for Vodafone Business. Prior to this Mehul was the Chief Operating Officer at Motorsport Network, which is the leader in digital media, experiences and games in the motorsport and automotive segments. Mehul had over 19 years of experience with Tata Communications across various international leadership roles in marketing, sales, operations and product management, including Global Head of Marketing and Managing Director of F1 Business.

Mehul is also a Non-Executive Director on the board of England Boxing, National Governing Body for the sport of Boxing in England and a Board Advisor for Motorsport Network.

Mehul graduated as an engineer specialising in Electronics and Telecommunications, before completing an MBA in Marketing and lives in London with his family.

In his 30 year career so far with Procter & Gamble and Shell, Rahul has led & grown several multi-billion dollar, global
businesses as P&L head, and helped lead several global brands. Over the years, he has lived and worked in the US,
India, Japan, Singapore, Switzerland and the UK. Rahul is currently the Head of Brand Strategy and Stewardship for
the Shell group worldwide, managing strategy and operations for a brand valued at almost US $50 billion. Under his
leadership and tenure, Shells brand value has grown by over +65% in the last 8 years. He is a recognized expert on
defining and embedding Purpose into organisations, frequently invited to share his thinking in international papers,
conferences and podcasts with other experts (eg. Professor Colin Mayer of the Oxford Business School). The
Authority magazine in the US featured him as a Social Impact Hero (link here) in 2022 and his work was also featured
in a 2023 Forbes article (link here). In 2019, he was one of 25 global business leaders across industries recognized as
‘Internationalist of the year’ for redefining contemporary marketing. He and his work have also been featured in
exclusive chapters for two books (‘101 Great Minds’, 2021; ‘Energy Branding’, 2023). Rahul is a member of the global
CMO Masters Circle (ANA), has won two Cannes awards and was one of 6 CMOs who contributed to the ANA Global
Purpose Handbook. In his early years, he was profiled as one of the top 10 young marketing professionals in India by
the Economic Times, ranked as one of the ‘top 50’ most powerful people in Indian advertising/media/marketing
(Pitch magazine), and featured by CNBC India in their show ‘Young Turks.’ More recently, his passion and success has
been in sponsoring the use of technology (AI in particular) to dramatically reshape marketing in Shell worldwide.
From 2012 to 2016, Rahul was the overall business head of the US $4 billion (~2.5 million tonnes/year) Styrene
chemicals business for Shell, leading global team members located in Canada, USA, Netherlands, Germany, China and
Singapore. He has significant experience in structuring and negotiating large value, multi-year B2B deals ($500m-1b
deal value) and in M&A deals of all forms. He was also an active leader in the global plastics industry, partnering with
customers and Washington DC based industry organisations to encourage recycling and other sustainability
initiatives. Prior to this role, he was the head of the LPG business for Shell in 13 markets (US $1.5 billion) where he
managed about 20 plants in Argentina, South Africa and Asian markets, 1500 people, large distribution chains and
complex government relationships. Rahul has strong training and practical exposure from various board and advisory
roles held with government JVs, listed companies, private sector JVs and non profit intermediaries. From 1995 to
2008, Rahul worked for Procter & Gamble in various marketing roles, leading country, regional and global teams. He
worked for them in India, Japan and Singapore in leadership roles worldwide.
Rahul has first class degrees in Economics and business (MBA) from the University of Delhi. He is an alumnus of
Oxford University, having completed the OUBEP program in Business Economics and also the Economics of Mutuality
program. He is an active learner and has completed multiple online certifications from Yale, Northwestern and John
Hopkins Universities among others.
He is an active member of the community as a Board Director and Committee Chair with the Food Bank SG, while
also advising SMEs, startups and mentoring talent. Married to Geetika (a psychotherapist with her private practice)
and with two teens, Rahul enjoys being outdoors, playing music and cooking. One of his passions is to inspire
organisations and young leaders in the private sector to be more purpose driven, leveraging their skills and resources
to make a real difference to the people and ecology of the planet.