ENGINE Group Australia announced today the launch of ENGINE Agency.

The full-service media agency will provide new and existing clients with the ability to apply ENGINE’s deep capability in research, technology and data to their paid media strategy, execution and analysis.

ENGINE Agency is spearheaded by multi-national Dentsu Group veteran, Grant Abrahams, and former CHE Proximity Head of Media, Calvin Cain (feature image).

Calvin Cain, said: “It’s an exciting opportunity to launch an agency with access to ENGINE Group’s war-chest of capabilities across market research, analytics, data and technology. The circumstances of 2020 generated some dramatic changes in consumer behaviour, so the ability for us to utilise our research and insights division on a brief-by-brief basis will be a huge advantage for our clients and represents a unique and dynamic offering to advertisers.” Cain joins ENGINE Group as a Director after spending the past year at fast growth independent agency, Principle Media Group.

Since its inception, ENGINE has grown into a research, customer and employee experience powerhouse, with clients including the Australian Government, Tourism Research Australia, J&J Visa, etc. on its roster. The launch is an indicator of ENGINE Group’s steady growth in the APAC region after introducing its Transformation division in 2017 and programmatic technology offering ENGINE Media Exchange (EMX) in 2018. The media agency launch coincides with ENGINE’s launch of a cookie-less attitude-based audience solution constructed from declared survey data, with initial results boasting a 30% greater ROI effectiveness than other data partners.

Grant Abrahams, said: “The combination of ENGINE research and technology specialities allows us to convert bespoke market research into actionable custom audience segments to improve campaign effectiveness for our clients, but it also provides advertisers with a new level of accountability and campaign measurement to instil confidence in their investments.” Abrahams, formerly Carat’s Director of Digital & Technology, joins ENGINE Group as a Director after more than a decade with Dentsu Group across South Africa and Australia.

On the timing of ENGINE Agency’s launch, Oliver Rust, CEO, ENGINE APAC, said: “Business pressures are always a catalyst for marketers to look at the partners they are working with, but the changes in consumer behaviour have been dramatic this past year and likely long-lasting. Marketers will need to evolve their strategies and approaches, and many may find that the partners they have now aren’t necessarily the partners that will be most equipped to take them into the future.”