Ete Davies joins Dentsu as EMEA COO of creative

Ete Davies, the former chief executive of Engine Creative, has joined Dentsu as EMEA chief operating officer of creative.

Davies departed Engine Creative in January and will now report to Dentsu’s EMEA & UK chief executive of creative, James Morris.

Morris plans to work with Davies to drive creative operational performance to make Dentsu become a more diverse and integrated network. 

Creative was Dentsu EMEA’s fastest growth area in 2021 and with the help of Davies, this area of the business will play a key role in Dentsu’s evolution, which is why the role has been created.

Morris has led Dentsu’s creative business across the UK and then EMEA for the last two years, bringing together around 2,100 people in 29 markets and leading agencies including DentsuMB and Isobar across the region.

Featuring in Campaign’s Top 10 trailblazers of 2018, Davies has previously been head of delivery at AKQA – where he worked with the likes of Nike, Booking.com and the BBC – and managing director at AnalogFolk London where he spearheaded its expansion into Europe.

Davies explained that his first meeting with Morris was like a reflection in a mirror.

For Davies, it was Dentsu’s values that attracted him to the role: “The expertise, the integrity, the ambition, the spirit of collaboration, are all things I've looked for throughout my career.

“I just want to work with great people who want to work together to do great deeds.”

Morris described meeting Davies as a “meeting of minds” as their principles and plans for the business aligned. 

“It wasn't just around the challenges we face in the industry and wasn't just around what we thought the future was or what we think are the key things to be done in the industry,” Morris explained. 

“It was also about work culture, it was about DE&I, it was about sustainability, it was about social impact.”

Morris added: “We're both determined to only work with what I define as good people. We all need to be diverse and different, but we need to share common values.”

Davies assumed his chief executive role at Engine Creative in 2019. It was an uncertain period for the business as it had dissolved its agency brands earlier in the year.

More uncertainty came last summer as Engine’s former parent company Lake Capital started the process of selling the agency. Next 15 acquired the Group for £77.5m earlier this month.

Davies described his time at Engine as “intense”, as he ran the business during such an unsettling period. 

He assisted the agency in restoring its commercial growth with some notable creative moments like the “Long live the Prince” campaign, which reimagined teenage football prodigy Kiyan Prince as a player in Fifa 21.

Davies said the biggest thing he had learned from his experience at Engine was the value of working with like-minded people and building a good working environment.

“It is so much about people,” he said. “Building a good culture and community of people that want to inspire, support each other, have curiosity about other people's skills and experiences and want to bring [things together] to make great things.”

A champion of diversity, equity and inclusion, Davies is also part of the advisory boards of several DE&I initiatives including Creative Equals and Facebook’s Black Representation in Marketing programme, and is UK chapter chair of Black and Brilliant Advocacy Network.

Dentsu appeared a number of times in Campaign’s School Reports 2022 diversity figures analysis, with one of the highest percentages of women in senior roles, one of the agencies to hit its IPA diversity targets, and highest percentage of BAME entry-level staff.

Davies said this was evidence of the network “delivering” things that other agencies only talk about. “That realistic commitment, investment, and genuine belief and passion in DE&I was what really inspired me to join because I'm working with people who get it.”

Davies added: “Rather than trying to convince an organisation and get it to change, the train is already running and it is well ahead of many competitors.”