WPP names Elav Horwitz as first Chief Innovation Officer

New Delhi: WPP has appointed Elav Horwitz as its first Chief Innovation Officer, creating a new role to strengthen its leadership in applied AI and deliver technology-driven solutions for clients.

In the new position, Horwitz will connect WPP’s global technology partners with the company’s creative and strategic talent. Her remit includes building a culture of collaboration and agile innovation to speed applied-AI use cases and client transformation, and to redefine how clients engage with commerce, create content and shape culture. She will continue to report to WPP Chief Technology Officer Stephan Pretorius.

A long-time advocate of responsible technology, Horwitz serves as an advisor to the Spotify and Meta Creative Councils and is a founding member of the leadership community Chief.

WPP said the appointment underscores continued investment in technology and data and follows recent innovation hires: Daniel Barak as Global Creative and Innovation Lead, Sarah Salter as VP, Global Partnerships & AI Innovation, and Mathieu Albrand as Director, AI Strategy and Innovation. The expanded team will work with Horwitz and Pretorius to advance WPP’s innovation agenda.

“Innovation is at the heart of everything we do at WPP, and Elav’s promotion to Chief Innovation Officer together with the world-class team she is assembling underscores our commitment to actively shape the future of our industry,” Pretorius said. “She will be instrumental in ensuring our company remains at the center of technology-driven innovation, translating the power of applied AI into concrete solutions that drive material business impact for our clients.”

“Never before has the need for innovation and agility been more critical than in our AI era,” Horwitz said. “We must show our teams, clients and the entire industry what’s possible by uniting the best talents, capabilities, partners and a forward-thinking mindset, enabling us to deliver results in a matter of hours and make the future both tangible and democratised.”

“As we rewrite the marketing playbook for the AI era, we’re thrilled to have Elav lead our innovation agenda,” said Cindy Rose, CEO, WPP. “This appointment underscores our investment to embed innovation into the core of everything we do, ensuring our clients benefit from the most advanced and effective solutions.”

Under Horwitz’s remit, WPP’s innovation team will focus on three connected pillars. The first is innovative talent: expanding the Creative Tech Apprenticeship programme and its network of 50-plus emerging creative technologists to deliver rapid prototyping, experimentation and AI-powered production for brands, while connecting Gen Z innovators directly with clients.

Google has joined as the programme’s primary curriculum partner for a nine-week course covering creative coding, generative AI and robotics.

The second pillar is cutting-edge technology models: widening client access to advanced AI and related tools through partnerships with Adobe, Amazon, Google, IBM, Meta, Microsoft, Roblox, Spotify, Stability AI, TikTok, Universal Music Group, Vercel and others, alongside collaborations with start-ups.

Horwitz will continue to lead WPP’s framework for identifying, testing and integrating partner models. With early access, WPP said it can produce campaign-ready assets in days and deliver efficiency gains of up to 70 per cent.

The third pillar is innovation in motion: co-creation in WPP Open and WPP Open Pro with partners, re-engineering workflows and embedding AI across the creative, production and media lifecycle. As part of this, WPP will pilot an AI Client Council to let key clients discuss and test emerging solutions before scaling them across portfolios.

WPP said these initiatives are already producing results, citing AKQA’s “The Generative Store,” which redefines personalised retail and enhances campaign planning.

The appointment follows WPP’s unveiling of WPP Open Pro, a new edition of its AI marketing platform WPP Open, designed to put the company’s AI capabilities directly in clients’ hands so brands of all sizes can plan, create and publish campaigns independently.