Dentsu’s Carat named Mike Law its new U.S. CEO, replacing Angela Steele, who is leaving the agency for a new role at Publicis Groupe. 

Law, who currently serves as U.S. president of Amplifi, Dentsu’s media innovation and investment arm, will take the reins of Carat in January. 

"If you think about media leaders today they really need to be ahead of the curve in understanding what the industry is facing—the disruption of video, disruption of measurement, future of how we work, way we think about attention and how we buy, even diversity, not only in how we show up, but where we show up. Mike has been a part of these conversations for a long time at Dentsu," said Doug Rozen, CEO, Dentsu Media Americas.

In the role, Law, who joined the company more than two decades ago, will be responsible for Carat’s strategic direction and growth in the U.S. He will continue to report to Rozen, as well as Fiona Lloyd, global client and brand president of Carat. 

Law becomes CEO at a time of meaningful transformation in the media industry and said it is time for a "reset" of what the media marketplace looks like. 

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Law joined Carat in 2000, spending a decade buying national TV, before leaving the agency to work on Pfizer’s media team. He retuned to the agency in 2012 as senior VP of video before assuming his current role overseeing all investment, programmatic, partnerships and content across the network. He was also instrumental in the creation of a new unit, dubbed Economic Empowerment, aimed at making the media industry more diverse by helping to grow minority-owned media companies and connecting them with advertisers. 

Dentsu also announced that Cara Lewis is also being elevated to U.S. chief investment officer of Dentsu Media. She had previously served as executive VP of U.S. media investment for Dentsu’s media agencies. 

The shakeup at the Japanese holding company comes following some significant hires in recent months. Last week, Carat appointed Mike Parker as its new executive client president overseeing the global Microsoft media business across all markets for the network. Earlier this month, Dentsu announced that Toshihiro Yamamoto intends to retire from his roles as president and CEO of Dentsu Group after five years in those roles, and will be succeeded by Hiroshi Igarashi starting in January 2022. And in July, Fred Levron was named global chief creative officer for Dentsu International.

Steele, who was Carat's U.S. CEO for two years, is returning to Publicis in an undisclosed new global role reporting directly to Arthur Sadoun, CEO and chairman of Publicis Groupe. The agency said it will reveal details when her position begins in January 2022.