….The exec departs just months after Publicis won Coca‑Cola’s media business in North America
Laurent Ezekiel, WPP’s chief marketing officer (CMO) and the chief executive (CEO) of WPP’s bespoke Coca-Cola agency, OpenX, is leaving the business for Publicis Groupe.
His exit was confirmed in a memo viewed by the media from Coca-Cola’s global CMO Manuel “Manolo” Arroyo. A second source with knowledge of the matter confirmed Ezekiel’s departure.
The media was unable to confirm Ezekiel’s new title or responsibilities.
READ ALSO:IFAT Africa 2025 reinforces its role as Africa’s environmental solutions hub
Ezekiel joined WPP as CMO in 2019 from Publicis. Following the ad network’s Coca-Cola win in 2021, he was appointed CEO of Open X, tasked with building a model that unified talent across creative, media, production, social, influencer, and other disciplines.
His return to Publicis follows Coca-Cola’s $700 million shift of its North American media account out of WPP to Publicis in March. This was followed by Mars and Paramount moving their media briefs from WPP to its French rival.
In his email to Coca-Cola employees, Arroyo stated that Ezekiel helped “architect” the WPP Open X marketing model. “He established a full integrated agile modern marketing team representative of the best of WPP across leading agencies and regions,” the CMO added.
While it handed its North America media brief to Publicis, Coca-Cola announced in May that it had renewed other major elements of its WPP contract, praising initiatives including StudioX, a hub that lets Coca-Cola create thousands of assets tailored for local markets.
Arroyo’s memo stated that Coca-Cola was “confident” in the future of Open X and would be working with WPP to identify a successor for Ezekiel soon.
The media has requested comment from Coca-Cola. At the time of writing, it did not reply. Publicis Groupe declined to comment.
A WPP spokesperson said: “A successor will be announced shortly”.
Ezekiel’s departure marks the latest high-profile exit at WPP, which earlier this month issued a shock profit warning following sluggish new business and client spending cuts.
Longtime CEO Mark Read will step down as WPP CEO in September, after seven years. He’ll be replaced by Microsoft executive Cindy Rose.
Discover more from The Industry
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
