Ogilvy UK creative chief Emma de la Fosse to depart for Digitas
Ogilvy UK’s group chief creative officer, Emma de la Fosse, is to leave the agency to join Publicis, The Drum has learned.
Emma de la Fosse
De la Fosse, who joined Ogilvy in 2011, will take up the role of UK chief creative officer at digital shop Digitas.
De la Fosse is the latest senior figure to leave the London offices of the WPP creative agency amid a restructure within Ogilvy UK by its new chief executive Michael Frohlich.
Chief client officer Charlie Rudd and chief production offer Clare Donald are among those to have left. So too has Jo Coombs, who was chief executive of now shuttered Ogilvy One, where de la Fosse was previously creative chief.
Reporting to Dani Bassil, De La Fosse will be responsible for nurturing and developing creative talent within Digitas as well as overseeing the creative output across all client work.
De la Fosse follows Anette King, the former chief executive of Ogilvy UK and now Publicis Group UK’s chief executive, who made a similar switch earlier this year.
De la Fosse was also named as The Drum's first Creative Woman of the Year winner in 2016.
Bassil said: “Emma is the best of the best. I’ve admired her for so long and I can’t wait for us to get started.
"To say this is an exciting new chapter for Digitas is an understatement – she is an inspirational leader and an incredible creative thinker. I know she will lead the team, the wider agency and our clients to new creative heights."
Earlier this year, Digitas dropped the 'LBi' from its name as part of a rebrand and reorganisation which seen it move closer to the media buying business of its parent company.
Along with the name change, Digitas was moved out of Publicis’s technology arm, PublicisSapient, and into its Publicis Media division to enhance and “clarify” its proposition to clients.
Commenting on her new employer, de la fosse said: "Creatively, [Digitas is] hungry to put itself on the map. For a hands-on creative director like me, there is nothing more irresistible. It’s an agency with enormous potential."
De la Fosses’ appointment follows recent creative talent elevations and appointments across the Digitas global network including: Scott Donaton to global chief creative and content officer; Atit Shah and Andrew Carlson to co-chief creative officers/North America; Sue DeSilva to executive creative director, Boston; Jenny Awasano to senior vice-president, creative, New York; and Matt Cullen and Gary Tranter to chief creative officers, APAC.