Coming off one the strongest years in the agency’s history, FoxP2 has announced three key leadership appointments.
Grant Jacobsen is group managing director, Mthunzi Plaatjie has taken over as the general manager for FoxP2 Cape Town, and Grant Sithole is the new executive creative director for FoxP2 Johannesburg. Founding creative partner, Justin Gomes, takes up a regional role as SSA ECD, overseeing the quality of the creative product across the DAN group. Former group CEO, Charl Thom, has taken on the role of group commercial director
The moves follow FoxP2’s recent partnership with The Dentsu Aegis Network (DAN) and are designed to “unlock the potential of DAN’s global data and digital expertise to fully optimise its creative offering”.
Having previously led DDB and FoxP2 Joburg since its inception in 2013, Jacobsen is tasked with combining the strengths of the two FoxP2 offices with the data and digital strengths, plus move the African scale of Dentsu into a truly game-changing offering.
“At DAN, we are absolutely delighted with the promotion of Grant Jacobsen as group managing director of FoxP2,” said Koo Govender, CEO of the Dentsu Aegis Network South Africa. “We have the utmost confidence in Grant and trust that he will continue to lead and scale our award-winning creative agency with strong leadership, passion and determination to succeed. The appointments of Mthunzi Plaatjie and Grant Sithole are testament to the group’s efforts to attract and on-board only the best talent the industry has to offer and we are confident this team will ensure the agency is led with talent, leadership, experience, and optimised creativity to service any client.”
Jacobsen said the team were “building the agency of the future”. It would be “a data-fluent, tech-savvy, enabler of breakthrough creativity. I’ve never been more inspired by the vision, the capabilities, or the leadership we have right now. Bring on 2020”.
In Cape Town, Plaatjie joins FoxP2 as general manager with years of experience. Prior to this new role, Plaatjie led the formation of Avatar Cape Town, and under his leadership, and despite the notoriously tough Cape Town advertising economy, had grown it to include some of South Africa’s top brands.
“Mthunzi brings a powerful entrepreneurial drive to the top seat in Cape Town. His incredible ‘can-do’ energy, a relentless passion for problem-solving and an all-round no-ego, no nonsense approach is one that clients and staff love. He’s absolutely the real deal,” said Justin Gomes, co-founder of FoxP2,
Plaatjie said joining the FoxP2 team was a huge accomplishment as he’d always been a fan of the agency and the work they produce. “Apart from the fact that FoxP2 is currently ranked the #1 medium size creative agency in South Africa, what attracted me to the agency (and the Dentsu Aegis Network, at large) is the ability to seamlessly integrate our best in market big data expertise with our technology and creative excellence. The combination of these capabilities positions us as a strong agency of today and the future,” he said.
Mthunzi is partnered by long-time FoxP2 creative stalwart Michael Lees-Rolfe as ECD in Cape Town.
Sithole takes the top creative seat at FoxP2 Johannesburg. Having won and judged at every major award show, and active on many industry panels, Sithole is a highly regarded leader, whose voice is shaping the future of this industry.
“It’s incredibly inspiring to be a part of this new chapter in the FoxP2 story. The prospect of leading the creative conversation on some of SA’s iconic brands is truly exciting and I can’t wait to get stuck into the Dentsu Aegis Network way while bringing that South African flavour and flair to it,” he said.
