Dentsu in market for Carat CEO as Squillace focuses on group remit
Dentsu is searching for a new CEO at its flagship media agency, Carat after Sue Squillace has been balancing the agency role with her increased group remit since being promoted in 2021, Mumbrella can reveal.
Joining as CEO of Carat in 2019 from Spark Foundry – appointed by then Dentsu ANZ CEO, Henry Tajer – Squillace was given the full remit of the group’s media offering last year. Since then, she has also continued operating as agency CEO.
Dentsu declined to comment at this stage.
Sue Squillace is searching for a Carat CEO
The search is ongoing at present and will continue as the group prepares for national CEO, Angela Tangas to depart in September, after being appointed as new UK&I CEO last week. A search for Tangas’ replacement is also underway.
At the time of her promotion, Tangas said Squillace’s increased duties was a part of “simplifying” things at Dentsu, a process Tangas has spent the past two years undertaking. This also resulted in a group CEO on the creative side being appointed in late 2021, in Kirsty Muddle, joining from Cummins & Partners, in order to create a clear path forward for the group.
“Now more than ever, we know our current and future clients want greater access to diverse capabilities, agile resourcing models, and improved effectiveness, to be their customer partner,” said Tangas in 2021.
The Mumbrella team discussed Dentsu’s trajectory on this week’s Mumbrellacast, looking at the timing of Tangas’ departure, after being appointed in 2019 to restructure the local business. Tangas’ tenure has been operationally focused, and she told Mumbrella this week that moving was a “bittersweet” decision to make, before getting to see her changes at the group come to fruition.
Tangas also said that as part of the restructuring of the operating model, it was inevitable there would be “some reductions” in staffing and clients over the past few years.
Last year, Dentsu performance agency, iProspect re-launched globally as a digital-led ‘end-to-end’ media agency, with a new brand proposition and capabilities. This came after the group merged Vizium into the brand in 2020, as part of a global group strategy to move forward under fewer, stronger brands. Across this period, Dentsu also rolled Amicus Digital, Davanti Australia, DWA and Gyro into Merkle Australia in January 2021, with Isobar staff later joining Merkle also, and the Isobar name living on, creating BWM Isobar.
At the start of 2021, Dentsu’s sports-related subsidiaries and businesses were also brought together under a new holding company Dentsu Sports International (DSI), to be known as “Dentsu Sports”.
Listen to this week’s Mumbrellacast below.
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Calum Jaspan was news editor at Mumbrella, based in Melbourne. He was also the producer and host of the Mumbrellacast. He left Mumbrella in May 2023.
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Wow, lots of CEOs in this business, must be costing clients a pretty penny
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