Asia Ratings is pleased to announce the first batch of professionals joining its Regional & Category Experts Program, an initiative designed to strengthen the company’s connections with important beverage-producing regions, specialist categories and the rapidly evolving Asian drinks market.

The first group brings together experienced wine buyers, sommeliers, importers, beverage professionals, market specialists and beer experts with expertise spanning some of the world’s most important established and emerging beverage regions and categories.

Asia Ratings welcomes Dominique Noël as Regional & Category Expert for Burgundy, Bordeaux and Champagne; Grant Smith for Australia and New Zealand; Kamal Malik MS for India; and Kenneth Ho as Regional & Category Expert for Beer across China and Asia.

Joining them is Alexandra Rendall, who will represent China as a Regional Ambassador across Wine & Spirits.

Together, they will help create stronger connections between producers, regional beverage communities and the Asian trade while sharing practical market knowledge, category intelligence and perspectives from across the international drinks industry.

The Regional & Category Experts Program has been developed to bring specialist regional and category knowledge closer to the Asia Ratings community.

Beverage producers today operate in an increasingly complex international market. Producing a high-quality wine, spirit or beer is only one part of building a successful international brand. Producers must also understand changing consumer preferences, importer expectations, distribution structures, pricing, positioning and how individual regions and categories are perceived in different markets.

This becomes particularly important across Asia, where markets can differ considerably in terms of category maturity, routes to market, hospitality culture, consumer knowledge and buying behaviour.

Through the program, Asia Ratings will work with professionals who have direct experience within specific beverage regions, categories and markets.

Regional & Category Experts will help bring greater context to these areas through educational content, interviews, market insights and industry engagement, while Regional Ambassadors will help build stronger connections between Asia Ratings and their respective markets.

The objective is to create an international network that benefits producers looking towards Asia as well as trade professionals evaluating, buying, distributing and building beverage brands across the region.

Dominique Noël
Regional & Category Expert – Burgundy, Bordeaux & Champagne | Wine

Wine Buyer and Sommelier

Dominique Noël joins Asia Wine Ratings as Regional & Category Expert for three of France’s most internationally recognised wine regions: Burgundy, Bordeaux and Champagne.

With 33 years of experience in the wine industry, Dominique has built a career spanning wine buying, sommellerie, quality control, market analysis, wine education, judging and events.

His international career has taken him across three continents and some of the world’s most influential wine markets, including Bordeaux, Paris, London, New York and, currently, Hong Kong.

Throughout his career, Dominique has held management and wine-buying positions across high-end restaurants, specialised wine and spirits retailers and the wine division of a major corporate group.

His professional expertise extends across wine and spirits, food and beverage, restaurant service, wine tasting, wineries, wine education, wine writing, events, quality-control systems and market analysis.

Having spent more than three decades buying, selling, serving, promoting, representing, judging and educating about wine, Dominique brings both technical knowledge and extensive commercial perspective to the program.

His experience in traditional European wine regions combined with his work in major international markets gives him a valuable understanding of how regions such as Burgundy, Bordeaux and Champagne are positioned, purchased and experienced by the global trade.

Through the Regional & Category Experts Program, Dominique will help connect producers and professionals from these important French regions with the evolving opportunities and expectations of Asian wine markets.

Grant Smith
Regional & Category Expert – Australia & New Zealand | Wine

Managing Director, Bespoke Fine Wine Co., Ltd.

Grant Smith joins Asia Wine Ratings as Regional & Category Expert for Australia and New Zealand, bringing extensive experience across hospitality, wine importing, distribution and market development in Asia.

Based in Thailand, Grant is the founder and Managing Director of Bespoke Fine Wine Co., Ltd., where he focuses on sourcing distinctive, high-quality wines and bringing them to leading restaurants, hotels and private collectors.

An Australian with a strong connection to the country’s wine industry, Grant is particularly passionate about championing Australian wine and the wines of South Australia. He is a member of both the South Australian Club and the South Australian Wine Ambassadors Club.

Before entering wine importing, Grant spent more than a decade in the hotel food and beverage sector, working closely with wineries in Australia. Those relationships ultimately led him towards the export side of the business and the opportunity to introduce producers to Thailand’s developing wine market.

Today, he works closely with family-owned wineries and boutique producers, helping them understand and navigate the Thai market while building sustainable relationships with local trade partners.

His work extends beyond importing and distribution into wine education, trade engagement, food and wine collaborations, sommelier-led tastings and value-added programs.

Having worked directly with producers as well as hotels, restaurants, sommeliers and buyers, Grant understands the practical challenges involved in taking a wine from its country of origin into an Asian market.

Through the Experts Program, Grant will provide producers from Australia and New Zealand with practical perspectives on market development, positioning and building long-term commercial opportunities across Asia.

Kamal Malik MS
Regional & Category Expert – India | Wine

Master Sommelier | Wine & Beverage Professional

Kamal Malik MS joins Asia Wine Ratings as Regional & Category Expert for India, bringing more than two decades of experience across wine, hospitality, beverage management and international markets.

Kamal is a Master Sommelier and the first Indian to achieve this prestigious qualification, joining an exclusive group of wine professionals to have attained one of the highest levels of professional certification in wine.

His career began on the restaurant floor and has progressed through a diverse range of positions, including bartender, bar manager, head sommelier, restaurant manager, and beverage manager.

Over the years, Kamal has worked with some of India’s most respected luxury hospitality groups, including Taj and Oberoi, developing extensive experience across fine dining, beverage operations, wine service, and the Indian hospitality landscape.

His travels through Indian wine regions around Nashik, combined with his engagement with local wineries and winemakers, have given him first-hand insight into the complexities of Indian viticulture and vinification and the continuing evolution of wines produced in the country.

Alongside his Master Sommelier qualification, Kamal holds the WSET Diploma, further strengthening his technical and theoretical foundation in wine.

Today, Kamal is part of Maritime and Mercantile International (MMI), one of Asia’s leading wine and spirits distribution companies and part of the Emirates Group. His role provides an international perspective across wines and spirits from established and emerging beverage markets.

As a wine professional and judge, Kamal combines technical knowledge, extensive tasting experience and an understanding of what makes a wine distinctive and commercially compelling.

His approach looks beyond scores alone to consider balance, character, typicity, authenticity, sense of place and the ability of a wine to communicate something meaningful through the glass.

As Regional & Category Expert for India, Kamal will help Asia Wine Ratings bring greater attention to the development of the Indian wine industry while sharing insight into its producers, terroirs, hospitality landscape and growing position within the international wine community.

Kenneth Ho
Regional & Category Expert – China & Asia | Beer

Beer Writer at The British Guild of Beer Writers | Co-Founder, Hong Kong Beer Geeks

Kenneth Ho joins Asia Ratings as Regional & Category Expert for Beer across China and Asia, bringing together experience in beer judging, writing, education and the development of craft beer culture across the region.

Kenneth is the Co-Founder of Hong Kong Beer Geeks and a board member of the Hong Kong Craft Beer Association, where he works to connect beer drinkers, professionals and the wider market.

Dedicated to spreading craft beer culture, Kenneth is actively involved in beer seminars, educational activities and food-and-beer pairing courses, helping consumers and industry professionals develop a deeper understanding of beer styles, flavour and brewing culture.

He is also an international beer judge and a member of The British Guild of Beer Writers, bringing both technical tasting experience and a strong communication and education perspective to the category.

His work places him at the intersection of beer appreciation, industry engagement and market development, giving him first-hand insight into the growth and evolution of craft beer across Hong Kong, China and the wider Asian region.

As beer continues to diversify beyond mainstream lager into craft, speciality and internationally influenced styles, education and category understanding are becoming increasingly important to consumers and trade buyers alike.

Through the Regional & Category Experts Program, Kenneth will help Asia Ratings strengthen its engagement with breweries, beer professionals and beer communities across China and Asia while sharing insights into beer culture, judging, category development and emerging market opportunities.

His role will also provide producers from beer markets around the world with a specialist perspective on how beer styles, innovation and craft culture are developing across Asia.

Alexandra Rendall
Regional Ambassador – China & Asia | Wine

Wine Business Executive | China & Asia Market Specialist | Founder, Embassy of Wine

Alexandra Rendall joins Asia Wine Ratings as Regional Ambassador for China across Wine & Spirits.

A wine industry professional, entrepreneur, and market specialist, Alexandra has extensive experience across the international wine trade and Asian markets.

Based in Hong Kong and Vietnam during her career, she has worked at the intersection of wine, international business, market development, and professional networking, with a particular focus on mainland China and Southeast Asia.

Alexandra is the founder of Embassy of Wine, a Hong Kong-based business connecting international wine producers with the Asian wine trade.

Through Embassy of Wine, she works with wineries, importers, distributors and wine professionals to identify opportunities, develop commercial relationships and navigate the complexities of doing business across Asian markets.

Her expertise encompasses the commercial journey from producer to market, including brand positioning, importer and distributor relationships, portfolio development, sales, communication and professional events.

Over the years, she has developed an extensive network connecting wine-producing regions around the world with Asia's professional wine community.

China represents a particular area of expertise for Alexandra. She has closely followed the evolution of the Chinese wine market and its professional ecosystem while developing relationships with both international and Chinese producers.

Importantly, her perspective extends beyond viewing China solely as an export destination. As China's domestic wine industry develops, the country is increasingly relevant as both a major beverage market and an emerging wine-producing nation.

As Regional Ambassador for China, Alexandra will help strengthen Asia Wine Ratings' engagement with the Chinese wine and spirits trade, producers and industry professionals while supporting greater dialogue between China and the wider international beverage community.

Connecting Global Wine Regions With the Asian Market

Asia continues to represent one of the most diverse and strategically important areas of the international wine industry.

Rather than being a single homogeneous market, the region encompasses mature wine hubs and rapidly developing markets, each with distinct distribution structures, consumer preferences, hospitality cultures and opportunities for international producers.

This is why market-specific and region-specific expertise matters.

Asia Wine Ratings evaluates wines from a commercial as well as quality perspective, recognising that success in today's market requires more than producing a technically excellent wine.

Entries are assessed on the combination of:

- Quality
- Value
- Packaging

The judging philosophy reflects the realities faced by importers, distributors, retailers and hospitality buyers when deciding which wines have the potential to succeed in the market.

The Regional & Category Experts Program builds further on this approach by connecting the competition with professionals who understand both where wines come from and the markets in which those wines ultimately need to compete.

Dominique Noël, Grant Smith and Kamal Malik MS bring specialist perspectives spanning France, Australia, New Zealand, India, Italy and Austria, while Alexandra Rendall will help strengthen the competition's engagement with China as Regional Ambassador.

This is the first batch of Asia Wine Ratings Regional & Category Experts and Ambassadors, with further appointments to be announced as the program expands.

Over the coming months, Asia Wine Ratings will share interviews, regional insights, market perspectives and educational content from its Experts and Ambassadors, giving producers and the wider trade greater access to their knowledge and experience.

Stay tuned to learn more about the people, regions and markets shaping the next chapter of Asia Wine Ratings.

Header Image: First Batch of Asia Ratings Regional & Category Experts and Ambassadors

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