REG - S4 Capital PLC - Maverick Digital to merge with Media.Monks

S4 CapitalAnnouncement

01/12/2021 07:00

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RNS Number : 1170U  S4 Capital PLC  01 December 2021

1 December

 

S4 Capital plc ("S(4)Capital" or "the Company")

 

Combination with Salesforce specialist Maverick Digital, expanding
Data&digital media practice and CRM capabilities

 

S(4)Capital plc (SFOR.L), the tech-led, new age/new era digital advertising
and marketing services company, announces a combination between Maverick
Digital (https://www.maverickdigital.com/) and Media.Monks
(https://media.monks.com/) , which significantly expands the capabilities of
its Data&digital media and Technology services practices and augments its
global Salesforce capabilities. Maverick Digital is a leader in digital
transformation strategy, Salesforce platform implementation, integration
strategy & execution and managed services.

 

Maverick Digital was founded in 2018 by Belal El-Harazin
(https://www.linkedin.com/in/belharazin/) in Chicago as a focused Salesforce
implementation partner across all its clouds and products. Following rapid
growth, it is today recognised by Salesforce as a Crest Partner with almost 50
certified professionals including delivery capabilities in India and Canada.
It provides multi-cloud services to enterprise clients including Mercy Health,
Madison Square Garden and The Chicago Blackhawks.

 

This is the second merger this year in the Salesforce partner ecosystem for
Media.Monks, following the combination with Destined, based in Asia Pacific in
July. It also coincides with the announcement that Scott Jamieson
(https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottjamieson/) , formerly President at Vigorate
Digital Solutions, has joined Media.Monks in the newly created role of Global
VP Salesforce Practice to drive its rapidly expanding practice.

 

Sir Martin Sorrell, S(4)Capital Executive Chairman said "At S(4)Capital we
differentiate ourselves by being the most agile, knowledgeable and creative
partners to the world's leading platforms, hardware and software companies.
We're delighted to welcome Belal, Carlos and their colleagues, as we expand
our relationship with Salesforce providing services around its various clouds
in the key US market and beyond."

 

Belal El-Harazin, Maverick Digital CEO and Founder, said "We couldn't be more
excited to join forces with Media.Monks and S(4)Capital and collaborate with
their global Salesforce service offering. It's a fantastic opportunity to be
able to bring the offerings of the wider group to our clients and provide even
more opportunities for our people."

 

Chris Martin, Media.Monks Co-Founder and S(4)Capital Executive Director, said
"We've seen incredibly strong demand for CRM and specifically Salesforce
expertise from our clients. Belal and his team at Maverick Digital will bring
additional expertise and scale to one of our fastest expanding service
areas."

 

Scott Jamieson, Media.Monks Global VP Salesforce Practice said "I'm excited to
join Media.Monks to expand their growing Salesforce capabilities. We are
well-positioned to disrupt traditional agency thinking with a model that
allows Salesforce to be integrated seamlessly into data-driven marketing
strategies at scale."

 

 

Enquiries

 

 S(4)Capital plc                              Tel: +44 (0)20 3793 0003
 Sir Martin Sorrell, Executive Chairman

 Powerscourt (PR adviser to S(4)Capital plc)  Tel: +44 (0)7970 246 725
 Elly Williamson
 Jane Glover

 

About Maverick Digital

 

Maverick Digital is a Salesforce Crest Consulting Partner and MuleSoft
Partner, enabling clients to create deeper customer connections. Headquartered
in Chicago, Maverick Digital serves Fortune 500 brands as well as fast growing
startups, ushering in some of the most ambitious customer experience digital
transformations in Manufacturing, Retail, Consumer Goods, Communications,
Media and High-Tech.

 

About S(4)Capital

S(4)Capital plc (SFOR.L) is the tech-led, new age/new era digital advertising
and marketing services company, established by Sir Martin Sorrell in May 2018.

Its strategy is to build a purely digital advertising and marketing services
business for global, multinational, regional, local clients and
millennial-driven influencer brands. This will be achieved by integrating
leading businesses in three practice areas: content, data&digital media
and technology services, along with an emphasis on "faster, better, cheaper"
executions in an always-on consumer-led environment, with a unitary structure.

Digital is by far the fastest-growing segment of the advertising market.
S(4)Capital estimates that in 2020 digital accounted for over 50% (for the
first time) or $290 billion of total global advertising spend of $525 billion
(excluding over $500 billion of trade promotion marketing, the primary target
of the Amazon advertising platform) and projects that by 2022 total global
advertising spend will expand to $650 billion and digital's share will grow to
approximately 60% and by 2024 to approximately 70%, accelerated by the impact
of covid-19.

S(4)Capital combined with MediaMonks, the leading AdAge A-listed creative
digital content production company led by Victor Knaap and Wesley ter Haar, in
July 2018 and with MightyHive, the market-leading digital media solutions
provider for future thinking marketers and agencies, led by Peter Kim and
Christopher S. Martin, in December 2018.

In April 2019, MightyHive combined with ProgMedia to expand operations into
Latin America and MediaMonks acquired film studio Caramel Pictures to expand
content studio capabilities. In June 2019, MediaMonks announced a planned
combination with Australia-based BizTech, a leading marketing transformation
and customer experience company. In August 2019, MediaMonks combined with
Amsterdam-based digital influencer marketing agency IMA. In October 2019,
MediaMonks combined with Firewood Marketing, the largest digital marketing
agency based in Silicon Valley, that was recently ranked, along with
MediaMonks and Circus (see below), as one of the fastest growing agencies by
Adweek, and MightyHive combined with award-winning UK-based digital analytics,
biddable media and data science company ConversionWorks and South Korea-based
data and analytics consultancy MightyHive Korea. In November 2019, MediaMonks
announced its combination with Delhi-based content creation and production
company WhiteBalance (completed in August 2020 - the delay due to necessary
merger clearance procedures) and then with fully integrated digital agency
Circus Marketing in January 2020 (completed in March 2020).

In May 2020, MightyHive announced a combination with Digodat, one of the
leading Latin American data and analytics consultancies, and in June 2020,
MightyHive announced its combination with Lens10, a leading Australian digital
strategy and analytics consultancy. In July 2020, MightyHive announced a
combination with Orca Pacific, a market leading full-service Amazon agency and
boutique consultancy firm based in Seattle. In August 2020, MightyHive
announced a combination with London-based Brightblue, an econometric and media
optimisation consultancy. In September 2020, MediaMonks announced its
combination with Dare.Win, expanding its geographical presence to France.

In January 2021, MediaMonks announced its combination with integrated
creative, technology and media agency Decoded Advertising, Shanghai based
creative agency TOMORROW and Stuttgart based automotive specialist STAUD
STUDIOS. MightyHive also announced its combination with integrated digital
performance marketing agency Metric Theory. In February 2021, MightyHive
acquired the assets of Datalicious Australia, a leading Google Marketing
Platform, Google Cloud and Google Analytics partner in Asia Pacific. In March
2021, MediaMonks announced it had entered into a conditional agreement in
relation to a combination of MediaMonks with Toronto-based design and
experience agency, Jam3. In May 2021, MightyHive announced it had entered into
a conditional agreement in relation to a combination of MightyHive with the
leading digital performance agency in Brazil, Raccoon Group.

On 26 July 2021, MightyHive announced a combination with Salesforce specialist
Destined expanding its data and digital media practice in Asia Pacific. On 8
September 2021, the new unitary brand Media.Monks announced a combination with
the iconic culture and creative marketing agency Cashmere, based in Los
Angeles. Also in September 2021, Media.Monks announced a merger with leading
digital transformation services firm Zemoga, headquartered in Los Angeles,
with further US offices as well as delivery centres in Colombia. The merger
expanded the Media.Monks offering into technology services. On 15 November
2021, Media.Monks announced a merger with leading creative content marketing
agency Miyagi. The merger added to Media.Monks' existing content and
data&digital media capabilities in Italy, Europe's fourth largest
advertising market.

In August 2021, S(4)Capital launched its unitary brand by merging MediaMonks
and MightyHive into Media.Monks, represented by a dynamic logo mark that
features MightyHive's iconic hexagon. As the operational brand, Media.Monks
underpins S(4)Capital's agility, digital knowledge and efficiency and is the
next step in delivering on its foundational promise to unify content,
data&digital media and technology services.

On 16 July 2020, S(4)Capital announced the successful placing of 36,766,642
new ordinary shares at a price of 315p raising approximately £116 million
gross proceeds which has been used for further expansion and combination
purposes.

On 19 July 2021, S(4)Capital announced it had engaged Credit Suisse AG, London
branch, HSBC Bank plc and Barclays Bank plc as lead arrangers for a seven-year
€375 million senior secured term loan. In addition, it negotiated a
five-year £100 million equivalent multicurrency senior secured revolving
credit facility with Credit Suisse, HSBC, Barclays, JP Morgan and BNP Paribas.
Both term loan and revolving facility were successfully completed in early
August 2021. This refinanced its existing €25 million and US$28.9 million
term loans and its €35 million and €43.5 million multicurrency revolving
credit facilities and will provide approximately £200 million for general
corporate purposes, including funding the cash element of future mergers,
which is typically one-half of overall consideration. The Company will
maintain its policy of maximum net leverage not exceeding 1.5-2x Operational
EBITDA.

Victor Knaap, Wesley ter Haar, Pete Kim, Christopher Martin, Peter Rademaker
and Scott Spirit all joined the S(4)Capital Board as Directors. The
S(4)Capital Board also includes Rupert Faure Walker, Paul Roy, Daniel Pinto,
Sue Prevezer, Elizabeth Buchanan, Naoko Okumoto, Margaret Ma Connolly and
Miles Young.

The Company now has well over 7,000 people in 33 countries across the
Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Africa and Asia-Pacific and a current
market capitalisation of approximately £3.3 billion (c.$4.4 billion) and
would rank well inside the FTSE 150. It achieved Unicorn status in a little
over one year, unique in the advertising and marketing services industry. Sir
Martin was CEO of WPP for 33 years, building it from a £1 million "shell"
company in 1985 into the world's largest advertising and marketing services
company with a market capitalisation of over £16 billion on the day he left.
Today its market capitalisation is £12 billion, having recently been
surpassed by Publicis for the first time. Prior to that Sir Martin was Group
Financial Director of Saatchi & Saatchi Company Plc for nine years.

 

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