Following the recent announcement that WPP has rebranded its media arm as WPP Media, the Irish business of the global media giant has followed suit and named its senior leadership team.
WPP officially confirmed that it was rebranding GroupM as WPP Media, with the former media brand- which dates back to 2003- being retired.
The chief executive officer of WPP Media Ireland, which has billings of over €200m a year, is Bill Kinlay while Ken Nolan, previously COO of Mindshare will now serve as chief operating officer of WPP Media (Agency Brands), taking on responsibility for sister agencies EssenceMediacom and Wavemaker.
Emma O’Doherty, meanwhile has taken on the role of head of client leadership with WPP Media Ireland. For his part, Jonathan Conlon will continue the role he held with GroupM but as chief operating officer of WPP Media (Activation).
According to the agency “with new routes to market, changing consumer expectations, platform dominance and a world transformed by AI, the role of media in driving growth has never been more important. WPP Media will be seamlessly connected with WPP’s wider global agency networks and capabilities through WPP Open – WPP’s AI-enabled marketing system – creating the industry’s most advanced platform for scaled and integrated creative, production, data, commerce and personalised media delivery services.”
“By 2030, media will be everywhere and in everything,” says Bill Kinlay, CEO, WPP Media Ireland.
“Every consumer experience will be a potential touchpoint and every touchpoint will be commercialised. In this new world, where media is so embedded in daily life, our work needs to be integrated across the entire marketing process and WPP Open will allow us to meet these challenges,” he adds.
Meanwhile, Mindshare, Wavemaker, and EssenceMediacom will continue to provide clients with dedicated teams as brands within WPP Media. “These teams will be empowered to think big, experiment and innovate in order to change from planning campaigns to planning business outcomes, with the strategy and technology to deliver measurable results for clients,” the agency says.
Like many agency holding groups, WPP has invested heavily in its artificial intelligence capabilities in recent years with WPP Open sitting at the heart of this offering. According to the group, it is investing over €300m a year in WPP Open.
Earlier this week, it launched a B2B ad campaign to promote WPP Open. Called “Transforming How We Create,” the campaign was developed by WPP agencies and aims “to demonstrate AI’s potential in ‘opening the door to the next stage in human creativity and enabling brands to connect with audiences in ways we never thought possible,” according to a statement from the company.
