Latest news with #AccentureSong
Time of India
7 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
WPP appoints Baiju Shah as Global CEO of AKQA
WPP has named Baiju Shah as the new Global CEO of AKQA , its design and innovation agency . Shah joins from Accenture Song , where he most recently served as Global Chief Strategy Officer. His appointment aligns with WPP's broader ambition to combine creativity with capabilities in AI, data, and technology. He takes charge at a time when clients are looking to harness rapid cultural change and advances in AI as business opportunities. His background in creativity, strategy, technology, and AI is expected to help guide AKQA into its next chapter. His appointment reinforces AKQA's focus on global creative innovation, with an emphasis on building products, services, and experiences that inspire, drive growth, and deliver meaningful impact for people, brands, and society. Over a career spanning 25 years, Shah has worked with leading global brands to enhance customer relevance and business performance. As a co-founder of Accenture Song (formerly Accenture Interactive), he helped shape the creative division's vision, growth strategy, acquisitions, and offerings while serving as Global Chief Strategy Officer and Senior Managing Director. He also led the company's efforts to integrate AI across its creative services, managing global teams that used emerging technologies to help clients innovate responsibly and stay ahead of change. Shah co-led Fjord, Accenture Song's design and innovation consultancy, growing it into 35 global studios and positioning it as an industry leader. He also played a central role in acquiring several creative and design firms, expanding Accenture Song's capabilities and reach. His arrival follows a series of leadership appointments to the agency's Global Executive Committee, marking a new phase of collaboration and innovation. A recent highlight for AKQA was winning the 2025 Cannes Lions Grand Prix for Innovation, a recognition of its pioneering work in the creative space. Mark Read, CEO of WPP, said: 'I am delighted to welcome Baiju Shah as the new leader for AKQA, and excited to see how he will redefine what a modern creative company can deliver for clients. Over the past two decades, he has demonstrated that he is one of our industry's leaders in bringing strategy, creativity and emerging technology together. I know Baiju's arrival will bring even further momentum to the business. "I would also like to thank Stephan Pretorius for stepping in as AKQA's Interim Chair over the past eight months. His steady leadership and deep understanding of AKQA's business have been key in guiding the team through this important period of transition and in setting the stage for its future success.' Baiju Shah, Global CEO of AKQA, said: 'AKQA has always stood for iconic, creative innovation. I'm honoured to join a company whose heritage is not just history, but a foundation for what comes next. As AI and cultural shifts transform how business operates and how creativity itself is practised, we have a remarkable opportunity to create work that shapes how people live and connect. AKQA is uniquely equipped for this moment, combining craft, technology, and a deep understanding of people and culture. "This is about more than creative output. It's about achieving meaningful growth, setting new standards for innovation, and proving that imagination remains the most powerful force for building futures worth living in. I'm excited to lead AKQA into its next chapter, honouring our legacy while reimagining what an agency can be. AKQA will serve as a testing ground for the innovative and responsible use of AI, acting as pioneers for our clients, for WPP, and the future.' Stephan Pretorius, Chief Technology Officer at WPP, said: 'It's been a privilege to act as Interim Chair of AKQA and work alongside such a talented and committed global team. I'm incredibly proud of what we've achieved together during this period of transition. Baiju is the perfect choice to lead AKQA, and I look forward to supporting him as we continue to shape the future of our industry.'
Business Insider
09-06-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
The exit of ad giant WPP's CEO signals the end of Madison Avenue as we knew it
Will the last ad exec leaving Madison Avenue please turn out the lights? WPP CEO Mark Read said Monday that he plans to step down after seven years leading the advertising giant and more than 30 years at the company. He will continue as CEO until the end of the year to see through the transition to his successor, who hasn't been named. The announcement comes at a fraught crossroads for WPP and the broader advertising industry. Read's exit follows that of famed ad veteran David Droga, who said last month he plans to leave Accenture Song, the consulting giant's marketing services division, at the end of this year. Several longtime WPP execs have also parted ways with the company in recent months. Madison Avenue is grappling with upheaval as its profit centers shift from creating TV ads with catchy taglines and big branding ideas to trading media, integrating IT systems, and helping clients make sense of their customer data. The rise of artificial intelligence and its associated productivity gains also rips a hole through the traditional agency business model, where ad companies are generally compensated on the number of full-time equivalent employees devoted to an account. Add to that the threat from Big Tech giants like Meta, who want to cut out the advertising middlemen altogether using the power of their huge audiences and sophisticated ad targeting systems. Under Read, WPP has attempted to respond to these forces. In recent weeks, WPP rebranded GroupM, the division responsible for managing around $60 billion in clients' media investments, to WPP Media. The company said the streamlined media offering is powered by WPP Open, an AI-powered platform that helps its employees do market research, spin up media plans, and create assets for campaigns using generative AI. But WPP isn't fighting from a position of strength. The company's annual revenue declined last year, and WPP recently forecast another revenue drop for 2025, which it said reflected a challenging macroeconomic environment. Once the biggest advertising holding company by most measures, WPP was displaced by Publicis as the largest ad company by revenue last year. Publicis currently trades at a market capitalization of around $27 billion to WPP's $8 billion. The industry is also awaiting the creation of an even bigger ad behemoth later this year once the proposed merger of Omnicom and IPG passes regulatory approval. "The fundamental challenge is that an enormous amount of what the traditional holding companies do is commodity, and commodity can now be done using technology," said David Jones, the former CEO of the ad agency holding company Havas. Jones now leads the 10-year-old marketing and technology company The Brandtech Group, a WPP competitor. "AI is going to give the traditional holding companies their Kodak moment," Jones said. Read laid the groundwork for WPP's next era and its new CEO While Read is a WPP veteran, the 58-year-old wasn't an ad man in the traditional sense. He took a graduate job at WPP after getting an economics degree from Cambridge University in the UK. He left and became a cofounder of WebRewards, a digital coupons business he sold to the German publishing giant Bertelsmann in 2001, after the dot-com bubble burst. He rejoined WPP a year later, rising to become CEO of Wunderman, one of its digital agencies. Read took over the reins of the entire company in 2018, after the acrimonious exit of its longtime CEO Martin Sorrell, who had built the company from a seller of "wire and plastic products" — WPP — into what was the world's largest advertising group. While a fellow Brit, the similarities between Read and Sorrell largely ended there. Sorrell was famed for building WPP through a series of acquisitions, and still now at his new ad company, S4 Capital, is an archetypal "Davos Man," often seen on stage and TV offering commentary about macroeconomic issues. Read has kept a lower profile and has sought to simplify WPP's many agencies into a more uniform structure. Sorrell did "empire building," while "Read has been an empire dismantler," the independent media analyst Alex DeGroote said. Some industry analysts and insiders say this is to Read's credit. According to DeGroote's calculations, Read retired around 300 different agency brands, closed more than 800 offices, and realized around $5.1 billion for the company from disposals. WPP reduced its net debt to around $2.3 billion as of December 31 last year, down from about $3.4 billion in 2023. But the Read era of restructuring and layoffs has hit morale within the rank and file — a mood that was further soured among some WPP employees when he instituted a four-day-a-week return to office policy this year. WPP has lost key accounts from clients like Pfizer and the Coca-Cola North America media account, though it has also won business from major advertisers including Amazon and Unilever. Toward the latter part of his tenure, some industry insiders said Read would need to take a bigger swing — anything from taking the company private to making a landmark acquisition — in order to return the company to growth. Attention now turns to who might succeed Read. Industry insiders told BI that internal candidates for the role would likely include newly appointed WPP Media CEO Brian Lesser; the CEO of WPP's specialist communications agency division, Johnny Hornby; WPP's chief operating officer, Andrew Scott; WPP's chief marketing and growth officer, Laurent Ezekiel; VML CEO Jon Cook; and Ogilvy CEO Devika Bulchandani. These execs either declined to comment or didn't respond to requests for comment from BI. The search, led by the former British Telecommunications boss Philip Jansen, who became WPP's chairman in January of this year, is also considering external candidates. "I don't think it will be internal, but I don't think it will be a radical hire either — WPP does not need more restructuring," media analyst Ian Whittaker said. "I would look for executives at one of the other agency groups who are well regarded." One WPP insider told BI they expected and hoped the appointment would be made relatively quickly. "At the end of the day, we've just got to get our mojo and momentum back," this person said.
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
David Droga is stepping down as CEO of Accenture Song
Accenture announced on Wednesday that David Droga, CEO of its technology-focused creative group Accenture Song, will step down from his role in September. Droga will transition from his day-to-day leadership role into a broader strategic role as vice chair of Accenture. Spicy AI-generated TACO memes are taking over social media because 'Trump always chickens out' Lego's first book nook is an addictively interactive diorama Forget quiet quitting: I'm using 'loud living' to redefine workplace boundaries As part of the transition, Ndidi Oteh, who currently serves as the Americas lead for Accenture Song, will become the CEO of Accenture Song, the company said. He will also join Accenture's Global Management Committee. Meanwhile, Nick Law, current creative chairperson for Accenture Song, is set to become the creative strategy and experience lead. An award-winning creative executive, Droga founded his New York-based namesake advertising agency, Droga5, in 2006. Under his leadership, the creative agency won numerous awards for its innovative advertising campaigns. In 2019, Droga sold Droga5 to Accenture Song (formerly Accenture Interactive). The agency has offices in New York City, London, Dublin, Tokyo, and São Paulo. He became CEO of Accenture Song in 2021 after Accenture chair and CEO Julie Sweet asked him to step into the leadership role, as Sweet told Modern CEO in January. She saw the benefit of bringing his creative perspective to the leadership team. Droga's ideas helped to transform Accenture Song and accelerated the company's growth. As CEO, he introduced an operating model that merged creativity, design, technology, AI, data, and strategy into one connected platform. Droga spoke about how AI was transforming the advertising industry on Fast Company's Brand New World podcast in February. In a news release, Sweet described Droga as a 'once-in-a-generation creative leader and business builder' who has 'lived our core value of stewardship and has developed the next generation of leaders who will build an even better Song.' In today's company news release, Droga expressed appreciation and conveyed his optimism for the future of Accenture Song. 'With such extraordinary leadership in place, it felt like the right time,' he said. He also discussed his next chapter. 'After 30 plus years of leaping, I am ready to catch my breath. And being vice chair will allow me to do that, but also to contribute in new ways.' Shares of Accenture Plc (NYSE: ACN) were flat in early trading on Wednesday. This post originally appeared at to get the Fast Company newsletter:
AU Financial Review
29-05-2025
- Business
- AU Financial Review
Adman Droga looks ahead after stepping down as Accenture Song CEO
He is widely seen as one of the world's last big-name advertising executives, a link to the Mad Men era of big, bold campaigns. But Australian ad man David Droga says he is pulling back on the throttle after 30 years of work. The 56-year-old will step down in September as chief executive of Accenture Song, the creative arm of the global professional services firm. He will be replaced by Song's Americas lead, Ndidi Oteh, and will continue working on some projects as vice chair of Accenture.
Fast Company
28-05-2025
- Business
- Fast Company
‘You die if you stop moving:' Advertising legend David Droga on his plans for semi-retirement
David Droga is stepping down as CEO of Accenture Song, the global consultancy's creative marketing services unit. In September Droga will transition from his day-to-day leadership into a broader strategic role as vice chair of Accenture. Within only four years, Droga led Song's growth from $12.5 billion to $19 billion in revenue, all while winning Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity every year, I-COM Data Creativity Awards, Red Dot Design Awards, Webbys, and its first Emmy. Droga came to Accenture back in 2019, after Accenture Interactive acquired his ad agency Droga5. At the time, Droga explained that brand communications had gone far beyond just advertising, seeping into every time and place a consumer experiences a brand—from ads to retail to e-commerce. He knew the combination of Accenture's scale and digital expertise and Droga5's strategy and creativity would be in high demand. 'CEOs, CMOs, and CIOs all need to be on the same page, because they all affect each other now,' he said at the time. 'This isn't a nice-to-have. I think it's going to be crucial for any brand going forward. This is future-proofing.' Six years later, many brands are now just coming to terms with this. When Accenture Interactive was rebranded as Song, Droga (who was named CEO in 2021) saw it as another future-proofing move, to make sure the company's structure matched client demands. 'We're now more in line with each other, working on solutions together, same P&L, so there's no competing forces getting in the way,' he said. 'I think that's the only way to step up and deliver what clients need.' The final deadline for Fast Company's Brands That Matter Awards is this Friday, May 30, at 11:59 p.m. PT. Apply today.
