Dentsu Media Products and Services Names Michael Epstein CEO

Epstein will now serve as CEO of Dentsu Media Products and Services, while retaining his chief executive role for Carat. In the expanded role, he will be responsible for Dentsu Aegis Media’s brands, including Carat, dentsuX, iProspect, Posterscope and Vizeum, tasked with building out a brand portfolio strategy bolstering both the individual strengths of each brand as well as their combined offerings. Epstein will also be in charge of Dentsu’s product offerings, responsible for global product strategy and connecting product innovation with brand and performance marketing. He will continue to report to Dentsu Aegis Media global CEO Peter Huijboom.

“As the media landscape continues to change and evolve, it is imperative that we are structurally aligned to continue meeting our clients’ needs,” Huijboom said in a statement. “Michael is deeply embedded with many of our most valuable global clients. He has an intimate understanding of their evolving needs and the flexible and dynamic requirements our brands must have to meet them.”

“We have a remarkable set of media brands and assets at Dentsu,” Epstein added. “Bringing them all to life in a more integrated and less complicated way is exactly what our clients need and want so we can maximize the impact we deliver for them.”

Before taking on the global CEO role at Carat last June, Epstein spent more than two years as U.S. CEO for Carat, earning Adweek media executive of the year honors based on his performance in that role. During his tenure as U.S. CEO, the agency won new business including Intel, P&G and United Airlines. Epstein initially joined Carat from Mindshare as chief strategy officer in 2013.

This news follows Carat naming Angela Steele as Epstein’s successor in the U.S. CEO role in December and Merkle vet Peter Vandre as its first chief analytics officer last month.