Bill Imada

Bill Imada is founder, chairman and chief connectivity officer of IW Group, a minority-owned and operated advertising and marketing agency focusing on the growing multicultural markets. For more than 30 years, Mr. Imada has represented some of the top companies in the U.S., including Coca-Cola, General Motors, McDonald’s, MetLife, Southern California Edison, Toyota Motor Sales, Inc., Walmart Stores, Walt Disney Imagineering, Warner Bros. Pictures, Verizon Wireless and many others. His areas of expertise include multicultural communications, marketing, advertising, strategic public relations, cross-cultural training and crisis management.

Mr. Imada is very active in the Asian-American community and serves on several nonprofit boards, including the Center for Advertising Educational Foundation, Asian American Media, Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment, LAGRANT Foundation, PBS and the PBS Foundation. He also co-founded the Asian/Pacific Islander American Chamber of Commerce and Entrepreneurship. Additionally, he serves in an advisory role to many organizations such as Leadership Education for Asian Pacifics, Asian Real Estate Association of America, Asian and Pacific Islander American Scholarship Fund, National Association of Asian American Professionals, Racing Toward Diversity magazine, Kizuna, Japanese American Citizens League and OCA National.

Mr. Imada is a member of President Obama’s Advisory Commission on Asian American and Pacific Islanders. He has an interest in mentoring young entrepreneurs and has invested in several start-up companies focusing on real estate, crowd-funding and music. Several years ago, Mr. Imada sold 49 percent of his company to True North (now Interpublic Group).

Mr. Imada has a bachelor’s degree in business administration and is a graduate of the Coro Foundation’s leadership training program in public affairs. He is also a graduate of the AMBEP Program at the Tuck School of Business, and received an honorary doctorate from Anaheim University.