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JUAN CABRAL 27, FALLON

At just 27, Fallon's Juan Cabral is regarded as one of the hottest up-and-coming creative talents in the UK.

The Argentinian-born art director, who launched his career at Agulla & Baccetti before joining the multitude of creatives streaming into Europe, already has a string of advertising accolades to his name, including three Cannes Lions and a gold Clio.

Cabral graduated in graphic design from Buenos Aires University, went on to study art direction and creativity at the Escuela de Creativos and was named Argentine Young Creative in 2001. Since coming to the UK, he has worked on an illustrious list of campaigns that includes Orange, The Observer and, more recently, the BBC, BT and Sony.

Andy McLeod, the Fallon managing partner and creative director, says: "He has an acute sense of the need for advertising to communicate a strong, simple, single-minded message, but he manages to combine that discipline with a rare, artistic imagination."

MIRANDA EASON 30, NATIONAL MAGAZINE CO

The CosmoGIRL! deputy editor, Miranda Eason, has already proved her editorship credentials, having led the magazine successfully through a tricky time for the teen market while covering the editor's maternity leave.

Jan Adcock, the Cosmopolitan group publishing director, describes Eason as "the ultimate fun, fearless female". She adds: "She has a quiet and seemingly shy disposition but will often surprise and reveal herself to be both gutsy and passionate."

Eason began her career by providing free labour for various magazines and eventually landed an admin-based job on the launch of Hachette Filipacchi's B magazine. From there, she moved to the BBC's Top of the Pops magazine, the now defunct 19, and then became the features editor of Sugar.

BEN KINGSMILL 29, MCCANN ERICKSON

The account director Ben Kingsmill has worked on some of McCann Erickson's most high-profile campaigns - Bacardi, Coca-Cola and Unilever - and has been marked out by the McCann chairman, Rupert Howell, as a central member of his account management team.

Kingsmill launched his career at Delaney Fletcher Bozell before moving to McCann in 2003.He is known around the agency for his ability to balance strong client management with creative vision and instinctive brand understanding - and he makes no secret of the fact he wants to run an agency one day.

Christian Hinchcliffe, McCann's new-business director, says: "The energy in Ben's personality is apparent in just about everything he does. He's a hugely likeable character and will undoubtedly continue to excel."

BEN WEST 27, ZENITHOPTIMEDIA INTERNATIONAL

Looking at Ben West, you could be forgiven for thinking he was more suited to earning pocket money from a paper round than running two of the most prestigious and creative international media accounts in London. He hardly fits the beer-swilling stereotype you may expect to find waddling along the corridors of a media agency.

West worked on HSBC for four years. MindShare tried to lure him away to run the business when the account moved to WPP, but ZenithOptimedia fought tooth and nail to keep him, rewarding him with the senior account manager role on the $600 million HP account - winner of ±±¾©Èü³µpk10's global campaign of 2004.

Gently spoken and persuasive, the baby-faced Oxford graduate could sell you your own boots. Media owners say he is the kind of strategic big-thinker that international media has been seeking in vain for so long.

BILLY FAITHFUL 29, ROSS NEIL 29, HHCL/RED CELL

Are Billy Faithful and Ross Neil creative directors in waiting? According to Steve Henry, the HHCL/Red Cell creative chief, who has nurtured many a star team down the years, "there's absolutely no question of it".

In the 16 months since landing jobs at the agency, Faithful, a copywriter, and Neil, an art director, have already amassed an impressive portfolio of high-profile work. Not only did they create Sid the Slug, the Food Standards Agency's slimy propagandist for lowering our salt intake, they also came up with the inspired pairing of David Hasselhoff and Mike Reid for Sky Plus. Not bad for a debut television commercial.

It is a far cry from the time when the ferocity of the competition almost forced the duo to give up. And running a department is a long way off.

"We want to get the work done first," Faithful says. "We've a hell of a lot to learn."

MATT DYKE 28, TRIBAL DDB

One of the sharpest digital planners in the business, Matt Dyke joined Tribal DDB in 2000 from Millward Brown as an account planner. In the five years since, his creativity and his desire to push the boundaries of digital have proved him able to hold his own in strategic meetings both with clients and within DDB.

Promoted to head Tribal's planning team last year, Dyke has recruited three digital planners to the five-strong team and has been key to the development of the agency's growing customer relationship management offering.

He is also the first DDB planning wizard to come from an interactive background.

David Hackworthy, DDB London's chief strategic officer, says Dyke is "one of a great new breed of planners whose intelligence is matched by their ballsy approach".

RACHEL ROBINSON 30, LOUISE DAY 28, RAPIER

After graduating with BAs in design and art direction, the copywriter Louise Day and art director Rachel Robinson were snapped up by McCann Erickson Manchester after a two-week work placement. In doing so, they circumvented the often-protracted slave-labour stints young creatives are required to endure in their early careers.

The duo moved to London two years later and honed their below-the-line skills during a two-year spell at Tequila\London, where they won silver at the ±±¾©Èü³µpk10 Direct and the DMA Awards for the One Account. A mix of work experience above and below the line has stood them in good stead for their current roles at the integrated agency Rapier, where they work on the Telewest, AA and Smart accounts.

They are just as creative outside work. Robinson has built a website that showcases her own and others' illustrations, while Day writes short stories and has embarked on a chick-lit novel.

FRANCESCA SELLERS 29, WIEDEN & KENNEDY

Francesca Sellers, the account director on Honda, is in charge of one of the most enviable pieces of business in town. But according to Neil Christie, Wieden & Kennedy's managing director, she is also "the Honda campaign's unsung hero". In her time at the agency, Sellers has helped to produce the award-winning "cog", "everyday" and "grr" ads and Christie credits her "insight, commitment and account handling skills" as being key to developing a relationship of trust between the agency and client.

Sellers began her advertising career as a graduate trainee at Lowe Howard-Spink. She them moved to Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R, where she was an account director on Marks & Spencer and thetrainline.com, and cut her teeth pitching on the COI Communications and Halifax accounts.

SIMON SMITH 29, WEAPON 7

Simon Smith is viewed as a pioneer in the world of interactive advertising.

In 2001 he founded Weapon 7, one of the first creative agencies to produce interactive TV ads, and has gone on to work for clients such as Honda, Adidas and HSBC.

Before the start-up, Smith cut his teeth as a games designer at Millennium Interactive and ended up in the lofty role of head of ideas at the interactive agency Phosphorus, winning projects for Procter & Gamble and working on accounts including Sony.

Yasmin Al-Jeboury, the brand marketing manager at Nissan, one of Smith's clients, says: "It is my view that real creative talent is rarely original but Simon approached the relatively new medium of interactive TV with fantastic work that easily won our pitch."

ADAM FOLEY 26, STARCOM MEDIAVEST

Outside the four walls of the agency, you are most likely to find music fanatic Adam Foley at a gig or plugged into his iPod. But at Starcom, as head of the regional development team, Foley spends his time juggling the huge workload that comes with servicing more than 30 clients.

After starting his career at ZenithOptimedia, Foley jumped ship to Starcom, bringing BT's regional press account with him at the client's request.

The client at BT likes him so much that Foley has worked on the account for nearly four years. "His personality and intelligence enables him to deliver the best solution to a client's business needs by always challenging the brief," Iain Jacob, the chief executive of Starcom Mediavest, says.

SAM LANYON JONES 28, ANDREW COPE 29, PICASSO PICTURES

When Sam Lanyon Jones gatecrashed a party at Andrew Cope's in 2002, neither could have suspected they would soon make ads for one of the world's biggest corporations.

The directorial duo jumped on to the creative radar with their tokyoplastic.com website - a homage to Japanese animation. "We'd heard whisperings about a fantastic website called tokyoplastic and were delighted to find that there were two very real people behind the digital persona. Not only real, but exceptionally talented and really good guys," says Jane Bolton, the executive producer of Picasso Pictures, which signed them in 2004.

With freelance work for Aiwa, MTV and Nickelodeon under their belts, it was not long before a big job came in - a seven-spot campaign for Microsoft.

ADELE GRITTON 28, CLEAR CHANNEL

Adele Gritton has continued to rise through the research ranks since winning the Young Industry Newcomer award at the 2002 Media Research Group conference.

At just 28, she develops and manages research across Clear Channel's three main divisions - Adshel, billboards and Taxi Media - as well as representing the company at Postar committee level.

Gritton started her career as a researcher for Good Morning Wales at the BBC before moving to London and the media industry. Her agency career has spanned CIA and PHD, where she won an IPA silver award for BT Cellnet's sponsorship of the second series of Big Brother.

Gritton is also a regular conference speaker and has delivered provocative papers such as "Experience the experiment: and let's take some bias out of research".

She also sits on Postar's methodology committee.

DAN HILL 26, JWT

Dan Hill, a business graduate who started out working in account management, has become one of JWT's most highly regarded young planners. During his two years in the job, he has already made an impact on the agency's creative output and was instrumental in winning the Kingsmill business. He now works on the high-profile Nestle and Kellogg accounts, along with other brands in the Allied Bakeries stable.

Hill has a reputation for being passionate and having a good understanding of the industry, while clients are impressed by his maturity. JWT's director of strategy and development, Marco Rimini, says: "Dan is an incendiary mix of charm and intellect. He really gets it creatively and is a great communicator, which is a fantastic combination for a planner."

SARAH HARRIS 23, GARY WILLIAMS 24, ARCHIBALD INGALL STRETTON

The copywriter Gary Williams and art director Sarah Harris teamed up in their third year at Buckinghamshire College, where they specialised in integrated advertising and were awarded a commendation from D&AD.

After completing a series of obligatory placements at a mixture of advertising and direct marketing agencies, ranging from FCB London to Leonardo and Tequila, the pair ended up on a four-day spell at Archibald Ingall Stretton, during which they successfully cracked a TV brief for UIA commercial insurance.

The agency's creative partner, Steve Stretton, did not hesitate to offer them jobs there and then. "Sarah and Gary are probably the best young team I have ever worked with," he says. "They are extraordinarily mature, proactive and responsible, and impressed everyone here from the moment they walked in the door. Highlights of their short career so far include the Yoda in a Skoda CD mailing and winning the pitch for Scope."

REBECCA DAVIES 29, MEDIACOM

Rebecca Davies joined MediaCom five years ago as a planner from Starcom Mediavest. She worked on the Masterfoods account, as part of the team that won the business, before moving into her current role working across accounts such as Ikea, the One Account and Opodo.

Widely seen as one of the best planners at the agency, Davies is still focused on the strategic side of the business, but now takes a more general management role on accounts. Nick Lawson, a joint managing director at MediaCom, says: "She is upbeat, can-do, tenacious, gives no bullshit and everyone enjoys working with her."

ADRIAN MAWSON 28, THE MAIL ON SUNDAY

Described by The Mail on Sunday's ad director, Simon Davies, as "a real steady Eddy" in 2004 during his first year at the paper, Adrian Mawson blossomed having moved from the main newspaper to its supplements.

He now works on the ten-strong agency sales team focusing on selling magazines such as You and Night & Day to the Publicis agencies, Starcom Group and ZenithOptimedia. Mawson's strength lies in his popularity and strong relationships with agency contacts.

Mawson joined The Mail on Sunday in December 2002 after spells at the Daily and Sunday Express. A Hull University graduate, he devotes most of his leisure time to sport, playing rugby well and golf "very badly".

SIMON CAM 27, GLUE LONDON

Scam, as he was immediately nicknamed by his colleagues, joined glue in a design role straight out of college but quickly pushed to become involved with rich media and interactive projects.

According to Mark Cridge, the glue managing director, Cam is also a talented musician and a keen early adopter of digital film-making. So when glue decided to start Superglue, its own interactive film-making unit, Cam was the obvious choice to head it.

"He's very ambitious and intelligent and he's not quite yet aware of how good he is," says Cridge, a Face to Watch in 2001. "Simon is definitely going to be running agencies in the future and we wanted to give him some managerial experience to get him started on that track."

JEREMY BROOK 25, DRAFT LONDON

Jeremy Brook, an Aussie, landed in London four years ago and worked as a digital account manager before joining Draft in 2003. He became the agency's youngest senior account manager last year, when he was promoted after just 12 months in the job.

Brook has since proved himself by working on the stellaartois.co.uk and stellascreen.co.uk websites, the MTV Europe Music Awards and the launch of the Saab 9-3 convertible, as well as on successful pitches for General Motors' Saab-Vauxhall business and Bombay Sapphire.

"The first thing people notice about Jeremy is his enthusiasm," Sez Maxted, the managing director of Draft London, says. "He has boundless energy and a real sense of fun, which translates effectively into his work. He's also a bit of a maverick - something all too rare in our industry."

SHARB FAJAMI 28, VIACOM BRAND SOLUTIONS

In his three years at Viacom Brand Solutions, Sharb Fajami has made his mark with the media buying community by providing innovative non-spot advertising solutions and branded content.

He played a pivotal role in MTV's involvement in the Nike Freestyle campaign, which scooped the best overall campaign prize at last year's ±±¾©Èü³µpk10 Media Awards. According to Andy Zonfrillo, the television director at MindShare, Nike's media agency, Fajami stands out among his peers for his proactive attitude and the strong relationship he has with the agency.

Nick Bampton, the managing director of Viacom Brand Solutions, says: "He has a high level of integrity and shows maturity beyond his years. In fact, his only downfall is his expense claims, which often rival the national debt of a small developing nation."

SAM RICHARDS 27, PHIL BEAUMONT 27, EURO RSCG

Now in their seventh year as a creative team, the art director Phil Beaumont and copywriter Sam Richards were first united at Falmouth College of Art in 1996 and have worked together as creative partners ever since.

"They possess all the things you need from a team - creativity, diligence and old heads on young shoulders. Plus one of them can multi-task, which helps," Olly Caporn, the creative director at Euro RSCG, says.

The creative duo landed their first gig at Partners BDDH before it merged with Euro RSCG Wnek Gosper. The pair have notched up an impressive number of awards for their creative work, including a gold Cannes Lion direct award for the British Heart Foundation's "fatty cigarette" campaign. They also picked up a Cannes Cyber Lion for yell.com and were finalists in the ±±¾©Èü³µpk10 Poster Awards with the "love is" campaign for Tourism for London.

LORRAINE HOLT 24, PHD

Snapped up by PHD as a graduate trainee, Lorraine Holt's degree in management and economics has proved of great value in the econometric modelling and data analysis that is part of her role as media planner.

Holt has spent three years at the agency and is credited with testing and using new channels to breathe life into BT's narrowband offering.

She also produces insightful reports from seemingly incomprehensible business data.

Grant Millar, the head of media at BT, says: "Lorraine is one of the great unsung brains of our business. She has worked her way up from the intense data grinding and analysis that underpins the communications strategy and creative planning that makes PHD look great in BT meetings. She is a star of the future for the industry - and one already on our business."

VERNIE YEUNG 26, RSA FILMS

It was Vernie Yeung's doodles for an MA project that launched his career.

"Someone told me I should turn my drawings into a video," he says. And it's just as well he did. Yeung sent a selection of work to RSA Films and Ridley Scott has since tipped him as a directorial star of the future.

Although Yeung admits his dream is to make films, working on ads and music videos is turning out rather well for him - his work for the hip-hop outfit Faultline was named one of the most creative graphic ideas of the year at the 2004 Edinburgh Film Festival. Yeung has also worked on a cluster of commercials for Diesel, Canon and Citibank, the last of which recently picked up gold for best TV/cinema campaign at the 4A awards in Hong Kong.

MEGAN THOMPSON 26, RKCR/Y&R

Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R's composed Megan Thompson is a planner on the agency's high-profile Marks & Spencer account. They don't come much bigger than M&S and it is testament to the 26-year-old's abilities that she was asked to play a significant role in the recent "your M&S" rebrand, a project that led to her taking over the planning for the whole of the retailer's general merchandise business in September.

Thompson has a reputation for delivering intuitive thinking that gets under the skin of the target audience on accounts such as Virgin Megastores, Womankind and the United Nations. The Oxford graduate launched her career as an account planner at DFGW in 1999, where she worked on Daewoo, the BBC and COI Communications before moving to RKCR/Y&R two years ago.

DARYL CORPS 30, BEN KAY 30, ABBOTT MEAD VICKERS BBDO

The copywriter Ben Kay and art director Daryl Corps have already racked up an impressive array of awards on campaigns. Corps was appointed to the AMV board as a youngster of 26 and has twice been a judge for the Creative Circle awards, while his work has been recognised by D&AD on 12 occasions. Kay worked on the multi-award-winning "blue plaque" poster for The Economist and on Snickers "skate", which won at Cannes, D&AD and One Show. The pair are now working on the next Guinness campaign.

Nigel Roberts, AMV's creative director, says: "Their personalities are as different and complementary as their skills. They're not afraid to use words but they're just as capable of a good visual idea. And they have quite a rare skill for a good TV team - they're also a good print team."