Egyptian-born Ali Ali originally studied Computer Engineering at the American University in Cairo. Deciding he preferred storyboards to motherboards, he ditched programming to study Art Direction at the Miami Ad School. Luckily, his rebel move paid off—Ali moved on to build an impressive global career as both art director and creative director for the likes of Leagas Delaney, JWT, Leo Burnett, and DDB Berlin.

His directorial debut, Never Say No to Panda won him a Cannes Gold Lion Award, and was named by The Guardian as “one of the most watched viral campaigns of all time.” Never underestimate people’s appetite for watching pandas perform casual acts of vandalism!

Ali’s earned so many industry awards that counting them actually stresses him out. But we CAN tell you that he was recently awarded the D&AD Yellow Pencil for Best Director, a Gold in the Cannes Lions, and The One Show for his spot, Diesel. Recently, he was named by The Gunn Report as one of the top ten most awarded film directors in the world and ranked top ten Directors to move the needle in advertising alongside Taika Waititi.