Sethi will be taking on a newly created role which is intended to spearhead GfK’s efforts to enhance its relationship with clients across the emerging region. He joins GfK after two decades at TNS including stints as a director of TNS India, deputy MD at TNS Hong Kong, MD at TNS China and more recently head of consumer insights – rapid growth and emerging markets for TNS Global.

He will now be based at GfK’s offices in Shanghai, where he will work closely with the new MDs to customise GfK products to the region. The new appointments include Kyungeun Chang as MD of GfK Korea, who was MD of Ipsos/Synovate Korea, Nehal Medh as MD of GfK Consumer Experiences Singapore, formerly a regional director of Ipsos Singapore and Eliza Wong, MD of GfK Hong Kong & Taiwan, formerly CEO of Synovate China.

In addition to these new hires, Yoshi Fujibayashi has been promoted to MD of GfK Consumer Choices Japan from his role as senior executive officer at the firm and Alfred Zhou has been promoted to general manager of GfK Consumer Choices China from his role as sales and marketing director and Selinna Chin has been appointed as general manager of GfK Consumer Choices Malaysia, joining from IDC where she was VP of ASEAN business (South-East Asia).

Debi Basu and Frans Janssen, GfK’s regional COOs for APAC, said: “These appointments give an important indication of our commitment to leading the APAC market research arena over the coming years.”

Matthias Hartmann, CEO of GfK, added: “Our accelerated investment in Asia is one part of our Own the Future strategy. The core of this lies in new global and regional positions such as these in Asia, which support the shared utilisation of our existing data and resources.”