Agency news you need to know this week

Hello, and welcome back to Agency Brief. This week, we’ve got the exclusive on organizational changes at M&C Saatchi Group; plus, it was a busy week of dealmaking for Interpublic Group of Cos. Want to be included in a future edition? Reach out to ewan.larkin@adage.com and brian.bonilla@adage.com for consideration. Inside M&C Saatchi Group’s big changes M&C Saatchi Group has named Nadja Bellan-White as CEO of the North America Group. Bellan-White will also continue to serve as CEO of New York-based SS+K. Bellan-White will be responsible for integrating the company’s North American agencies under one P&L, according to M&C Saatchi. Those shops include SS+K, Fluency, MCD, M&C Saatchi Sport and Entertainment, Clear and M&C Saatchi Performance. One of Bellan-White’s tasks will be helping build bespoke teams for clients. She will report to M&C Saatchi Global CEO Zaid Al-Qassab. Read Ad Age’s Best of 2024 stories here In case you missed it Before we go any further, here are a few of Ad Age’s biggest agency stories this week: A week of IPG deals It was a busy Thursday for IPG, which announced that it had sold digital agency Huge to global private equity firm AEA Investors. The holding company is still shopping around R/GA. Shortly before that, IPG said it acquired Intelligence Node, an e-commerce intelligence platform, in a deal designed to provide the holding company’s clients with real-time product and market intelligence to understand shopper trends. Financial terms were not disclosed. Intelligence Node’s technology uses AI to aggregate and analyze billions of data points across over 1,900 retail categories in 34 global markets, according to an IPG statement. MediaSense has a new leader Consultancy MediaSense has appointed Jamie Posnanski as global CEO, replacing Graham Brown, who will now serve as executive chairman. Posnanski was formerly senior executive and global managing director at Accenture Song. The appointment follows MediaSense’s acquisition of R3, a deal that will give the consultancy an expanded footprint in Asia-Pacific and North America, as well as increased creative capabilities. Posnanski was a key figure behind many of Accenture Song’s acquisitions and integrations, according to a MediaSense statement. Also: Behind MediaSense’s deal to acquire R3 One cool stunt to go Ukrainian boutique agency Bickerstaff.734 is flipping the review process on its head, issuing a “client tender,” a search designed to allow the agency to “connect with businesses that share our values.” The creative shop created a website and recorded a trippy music video to announce the news. Check it out here. Read about all of the 2024 Marketers of the Year Just briefly Trade School appointed Amy Choi as executive director, creator strategy and marketing, a new role at the agency. Trade School is the sister company of Atlanta-based 22Squared. Dallas-based TMA (The Marketing Arm) made two staffing changes in its strategy department. The agency hired David Matathia as executive VP of strategy, a new role. He was most recently head of strategy at FitzCo in Atlanta. Fellow Executive VP of Strategy Kathleen Colditz will take on the additional responsibility of leading the scaling and expansion of TMA’s proprietary Cultural Resonance Score across the agency and Omnicom Advertising Group.

Agency news you need to know this week

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