Eleven International

Organization Name – Eleven International

Category – Services

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Founded in 2017, Eleven International is a boutique public relations and communications agency that has built its reputation on cross-border strategy in the tech sector. From its beginnings, the firm …positioned itself as a “lifeline” for emerging Asian startups looking to tell their stories globally. Headquartered in Hong Kong with U.S. incorporation and offices in Beijing, Eleven International now spans Asia, North America and, increasingly, Europe. In six years, it has evolved from a one-person consultancy into a global team, all while focusing on helping tech brands – from consumer gadgets to Web3 platforms – grow from early-stage obscurity to international recognition. The agency is frequently described as award-winning and cross-border in industry coverage, and it has been recognized with multiple PR awards as it navigates the intersection of Eastern and Western markets.
Origins as a Cross-Border Specialist: Eleven International’s origin story is closely tied to its founder and Managing Director, Francis Bea, a former tech journalist-turned-PR strategist. Bea has said he launched the agency to fill a niche: many innovative startups in Asia, particularly China, lacked a “reliable partner to tell their story to the world”. Operating initially out of New York and Hong Kong, Bea essentially was the agency in its early days – a solo operation catering to APAC tech founders. “Five years ago, [it] was started as a lifeline to unknown startups from the APAC region,” Bea wrote in a 2022 reflection, noting these companies had great products but needed help reaching global audiences. By late 2022, the firm had grown to a double-digit headcount, a trajectory fueled by word-of-mouth among startup circles and repeat business from satisfied clients. Even as the team expanded, its cross-market mission stayed constant. The agency first made its name bridging Asia and the United States – helping Chinese tech entrepreneurs gain traction in Western media – and over time its geographic reach widened. “Our roots in APAC-to-USA communications are deep,” the company notes, but it has since extended its scope to Europe and other regions as well. Today, the Eleven International team is globally dispersed, with incorporation in the U.S. and staff or partners in markets like Southeast Asia, the UK, and beyond. This spread reflects the firm’s core proposition: being “cross-border to our core” in an industry where few agencies truly are.
Client Work and Notable Campaigns: From the outset, Eleven International concentrated on up-and-coming tech brands, often acting as an early PR partner that could grow with the client. “We’ve launched leading consumer tech brands that top their respective industries,” Bea wrote, citing examples like augmented reality startup Nreal (now known as XREAL) in AR, camera maker OBSBOT in AI-powered imaging, and ForwardX in robotics. Many of these collaborations began when the companies were virtually unknown outside Asia. For instance, Eleven International has served as Nreal’s communications partner since the AR glasses maker’s inception in 2019. The firm helped position Nreal as a bold consumer-focused entrant at a time when bigger rivals (like Magic Leap) were targeting enterprise markets. According to a case study in Little Black Book, Eleven International crafted a full-funnel U.S. launch campaign for Nreal’s AR glasses, guiding consumers from awareness to purchase through influencer-driven reviews. The campaign reportedly lined up over 35 YouTube and Twitter influencers, amassing 17+ million views and even selling out the product’s first batch in nine days. Such results, the agency claims, helped rocket Nreal (XREAL) to the top spot in its category on Amazon’s rankings. In recognition, that Nreal launch campaign – cheekily titled “Beating Apple to the Punch” – earned a Silver Bulldog Award in 2023 for Best Technology Campaign. Bea has said the experience of orchestrating viral tech launches under intense deadlines (as he did with the Hover Camera drone earlier in his career) instilled a culture of aggressive, hands-on execution at Eleven Internationall. “Behind the success stories, there’s always a lot of prep… Part of the training for our ability to work aggressively for clients stemmed from [the Hover Camera launch],” he recounted, describing 20-hour days and all-hands effort.
Over the years, the agency’s client roster has spanned a who’s-who of rising Asian tech firms and some established names. In an October 2023 interview, Bea noted the firm has worked with Chinese tech giants like Alibaba, popular consumer electronics brands such as Xiaomi and OPPO, and global apps including TikTok. (Eleven’s work with TikTok has included campaigns for TikTok for Business, the platform’s advertising unit.) The firm also supported lesser-known but ambitious companies: it helped Castbox, a Beijing-based podcast app, break into U.S. tech media by leveraging the founder’s story and R&D angles, eventually landing coverage in TechCrunch and WIRED. It partnered with Xiaomi on a PR push to shed the phone maker’s budget image and present its flagship smartphones as premium devices on par with Apple and Samsung. As part of that effort, Eleven International seeded top reviewers at The Guardian, CNET and Tom’s Guide with Xiaomi’s new devices, resulting in a wave of positive press; within 24 hours of the Xiaomi 12 series launch, nearly 3,700 media pieces had been published – a 27.8% increase over the previous model’s launch coverage, according to the team’s figures. The agency has also reportedly advised Vivo and other Chinese smartphone brands (sister companies of Oppo) in their overseas communications, though details are less public.
In the realm of Web3 and crypto – a sector where Eleven International found early opportunity – the client list is extensive. “We’ve launched countless industry leaders in crypto,” Bea wrote in 2022, pointing to Asia-born wallets Cobo and imToken, crypto finance platforms like Babel Finance, and blockchain protocols like Conflux Network. More recently, the firm has helped raise the global profile of security-focused blockchain startups Sooho.io (South Korea) and Safeheron (Singapore), as well as gaming/metaverse studio Red Door Digital. These companies often credit Eleven International with securing their first splash in Western press or shaping their narrative for English-speaking audiences. Provoke Media and other industry watchers have noted the agency’s prominence in the blockchain PR scene; in one directory, Eleven International is described as a “leading global blockchain PR agency” out of Asiac. Still, Bea maintains a cautious approach to this volatile sector. He recalls that during the crypto booms of 2018 and 2021, some advisors urged Eleven to double down exclusively on Web3 clients – a strategy he resisted. “There were a lot of voices suggesting we focus purely on Web3… but it’s very clear now that would have been the wrong move,” Bea told Branding in Asia, referring to the subsequent market downturnsl. Instead, the agency chose to diversify across AI, AR, blockchain, consumer tech, and B2B tech, ensuring it wasn’t overexposed to any one hype cycle. This balanced portfolio appears to have paid off: when crypto cooled, Eleven’s business in other tech verticals kept rolling, and vice versa.
Services and Strategy: While public relations remains at its core, Eleven International’s services have expanded with client needs. By its sixth anniversary, the agency added go-to-market consulting, influencer marketing, social media management, copywriting, and branding support to its toolkit. In 2023, the firm underwent a subtle brand refresh to reflect this broadened scope and its clients’ “global ambitions”. The new visual identity drew inspiration from mountaineering – evoking the image of guides leading climbers to new peaks – an allusion to how Eleven International sees its role with clients. “As the brand storytelling goes, the firm helps its clients reach their highly ambitious goals and explore new markets, leading them to new peaks, [so they can] shout their stories from the mountaintop,” one trade outlet noted of the rebrand. In practical terms, that means positioning little-known companies as credible challengers to industry incumbents. The team prides itself on what Bea calls creative storytelling with a cross-cultural twist. “With Western media, the key is to bring an original take to a trending topic,” he explained, “which means pushing clients outside their comfort zone” to craft angles that will resonate globally. This might involve tying a B2B software company to a hot theme like AI ethics, or spotlighting a consumer gadget’s human impact rather than its specs. According to Bea, Asian founders sometimes need convincing to be bold in this way, but it’s often the ticket to top-tier international coverage. In one instance, the agency helped a Chinese 360° camera startup, Realsee, gain credibility by partnering with niche influencers in 3D photography – content that was then amplified through the client’s channels, yielding thousands of views and establishing Realsee as an innovator in an otherwise crowded field. These kinds of tactics – blending localized insight with global PR savvy – underscore Eleven’s cross-market strategy.
Industry perception of Eleven International has mainly been positive, marked by a string of accolades in recent years. In 2023 alone, the agency claims to have won a Gold Stevie Award (Asia-Pacific) for innovation in media planning, a Silver Stevie for media relations, and two Bronze Stevies for PR innovation. The Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA) named Eleven International “Small Consultancy of the Year” in the APAC region, and the U.S.-based Bulldog Awards honored the firm as the Silver winner for Best Boutique Agency. Trade publications have taken note as well. PRovoke Media included Eleven International in its watchlist of emerging PR players, and Branding in Asia has featured the agency’s insights and hires in its columns. In a Q&A with Branding in Asia, Bea struck a modest but confident tone about his company’s trajectory: he emphasized adaptability during economic headwinds and stressed the importance of staying nimble for clients. “We place a heavy emphasis on diversifying our business to help offset any downturns in any one area,” he said, referring to the need for flexibility amid market slowdowns. That ethos was implemented when Eleven International launched a dedicated China PR practice in late 2022, anticipating the post-pandemic reopening of the mainland’s economy. “We see [reports of China’s reopening] as a positive signal for brands that continue to have aspirations to break into the China market,” Bea commented at the time. By beefing up on-the-ground capabilities in Beijing – hiring a former Tencent communications manager to lead the effort – the agency aimed to help Western clients navigate Chinese media, and vice versa. It’s a two-way street: just as it guides APAC startups in the West, Eleven also assists Western tech firms (especially in lifestyle and consumer electronics) with entering Asia.
Throughout its growth, Eleven International has balanced being slightly promotional of its own brand with a largely behind-the-scenes role in boosting others. The company’s mantra, “Consider it done,” speaks to a get-it-done culture that clients, often venture-funded startups, value when racing to make a global splash. At the same time, the agency is careful to manage expectations in an industry prone to hype. Bea has openly criticized the lack of transparency among some crypto PR firms that promise guaranteed headlines. “There are a lot of agencies – particularly in the crypto space – that try to sell newswire results as if they’re earned press,” he told one media outlet, advocating for a more honest approach. Such candor has earned him and Eleven International a measure of respect in both East and West PR circles. Observers say the firm occupies a unique position: it is still independent and relatively small, yet it operates across continents and has an outsized influence on the global visibility of its niche clients. “Eleven International, a leading Hong Kong-based cross-border communications agency,” wrote Little Black Book in a piece on the Bulldog Awards, underscoring the agency’s status in its home base and specialization in straddling markets.
Looking ahead, Eleven International appears set on further cementing its cross-market role. The team speaks of pursuing more integrated campaigns that combine PR with marketing, and forming partnerships in new regions. In Bea’s words, the goal is to build “world-leading expertise” in connecting cultures and markets. For an agency that began by helping Asian startups navigate the U.S. tech press, the challenge now is mirror image as well: guiding Western companies into Asia’s dynamic tech landscape. By all indications, Eleven International is intent on doing both. “We remain committed to providing our clients with innovative and effective PR and marketing solutions that drive their success in the global market,” Bea stated after one recent award win. That statement encapsulates the slightly promotional but earnest tone the agency strikes. It claims to be a seasoned guide across the mountains of international expansion – and according to both its clients and industry commentators, it has indeed helped several brands reach new peaks on the world stage. Read More