McCann’s Ben Lilley revealed as Red Engine SCC acquirer with further acquisitions underway
Following Ben Lilley’s acquisition of national PR agency The Red Republic in February as part of his purchase of McCann Worldgroup’s Australian operations, Lilley has today also been revealed as the buyer of independent creative agency Red Engine SCC, which will be merged with The Red Republic. The acquisition is a further step in Lilley’s plans to acquire more advertising and marketing services businesses.
Reaffirming his commitment to taking an entrepreneurial approach to growing a national independent agency group with integrated capabilities, Lilley confirmed further acquisitions are underway and more will be announced over the coming months. Red Engine SCC’s Sydney and Melbourne businesses will be merged into the national operations of The Red Republic, which Lilley describes as “a natural fit for the rapidly growing creative content needs of The Red Republic’s national client base.”
Says Mia Hamilton (above), managing director of The Red Republic: “We are extremely excited to join forces with Red Engine SCC and take our content production to the next level. Content is king and it’s important to us that we’re offering clients the most creative solutions possible as we grow and expand. I’m thrilled to be working with Julian Townley and his team and can’t wait to make some incredible work for our clients.”
Says Julian Townley (above), founder, Red Engine SCC: “I couldn’t be more pleased to be joining Ben, Mia and The Red Republic’s national offering. Ben’s entrepreneurial ambition and track record speak for themselves and this is an exciting new stage of creative growth for our Red Engine SCC staff and clients alike. Our creative content experience and capabilities align seamlessly with The Red Republic’s integrated offering and I couldn’t imagine a more perfect new home for our business.”
The announcement comes during a protracted lull in acquisitions by other agency networks and holding groups in Australia. Lilley said his ongoing acquisition strategy offers independent Australian agency owners like Townley a unique chance to become part of a national and international agency network, but still be senior leaders in a national Australian independent. Lilley described this as a rare window for independent agencies who are looking to sell and achieve “the best of both worlds: combining multinational clients, career opportunities and resources, but in an independent agency culture and mindset.”
Lilley confirmed that his acquisition plans remain unchanged despite the global COVID-19 crisis, reaffirming his recent comments that “there’s nobody else in the market acquiring independents right now. And it’s unlikely we’ll see any more buyers for several years. So for agency owners thinking about selling their businesses or becoming part of a network, this is a chance to engage with our national group while we’re actively pursuing acquisitions.”
The Red Republic and Lilley’s broader agency operations have themselves grown on the back of a number of strategic acquisitions, including his first independent agency SMART, which McCann acquired in 2011 and installed Lilley as McCann chairman and CEO and then McCann Worldgroup Asia Pacific Creative Leadership chair. At SMART, Lilley also undertook a number of acquisitions, starting with digital agency M4 Interactive and followed by creative boutique VCD/Kindred, retail specialist The Foundry, design agency Illuminati and Queensland specialists Turner Sands and Logan Meo Walters. At McCann, Lilley also completed two further acquisitions, buying The Red Republic in 2016 and design agency Studio Woo in 2017.
Now Lilley intends to maximise the group’s national creative scope and scale by integrating more businesses in creative, data, design, media, technology and PR across Sydney, Melbourne and Queensland.
Says Lilley: “Our strategy is to scale our national suite of best-in-class solutions to best address each clients’ own specific suite of marketing communications needs.”
Lilley said interested agencies can contact him “through our awesome client, LinkedIn.”
13 Comments
Ben is Australia’s Mark Cuban.
Love a good penny stock
Well done Julian – you’ve earnt this. You’ll do well with this crew.
Anyone who buys McCann’s Australian operations is either a visionary savant with massive balls or a complete idiot. I hope I live long enough to find out.
Worked just fine for mccanns last time. My moneys on the ballsy savant.
Not sure what Ben is purchasing?! And hearing none of the staff are coming over…
Head of Content?!? You’ve bought the wrong part of the engine Ben..
Anyone who can sell a business and save some jobs in this market deserves to be congratulated. Don’t know you Julian, but well done to you. You deserve every success.
Unfortunately, it seems the only jobs saved were the two directors and a producer who will, no doubt be doing the work for them.
It’s a shame that this is being reported as such a good news story when so many people are left without jobs and didn’t even get paid for their final month of work.
At least JT has a job though. So yeah, well done on that front.
Group CEO to Head of Content/ Account Director…
This head of content reporting to someone will be interesting. I give it a month! My advice: treat people how you want to be treated because Karma will get you twice or four times. You have not given people opportunities they have given you this chance to make amends.
How about a story for the many owed millions from Red Engine? Yep – the 2 directors who ran the company get a nice new job. McCann get the clients / assets (bought for $20k) and all the suppliers who provided their products and services in good faith that they would be paid, get nothing.
Red Engine. Red Republic. Red Flag… I won’t be working with them again. I lost thousands.