GroupM Elevates Karin Ross to Lead Three DACH Markets

Dusseldorf (30th August 2023) – GroupM, WPP’s media investment group, today announces the elevation of Karin Ross to lead GroupM DACH, a united community encompassing three markets: Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. As GroupM CEO DACH, Ross will provide strategic leadership to GroupM in the three countries and will also continue to manage operations in the important market in her role as GroupM CEO Germany. Andreas Vretscha, CEO GroupM Switzerland and Austria, will report to her. 

GroupM is well established as market leading media agency group in all three countries and across DACH GroupM represents one third of all media billings. (Source: COMvergence) 

Effective immediately Ross assumes the newly created position after more than three years as GroupM CEO Germany and a total career of 14+ years within the WPP network. 

Aligning DACH markets enables GroupM to match clients’ requirements. As CEO, Ross will amplify the synergies between countries, creating standards and driving innovation from a unified source to support client ambitions and deliver on their business goals.

Josh Krichefski, GroupM CEO EMEA & UK said, “Aligning GroupM DACH this way meets client requirements. We retain our local expertise to inspire local customers, plus offer greater bundled expertise for international clients who already see DACH as a cluster. We’re formalising this as we see Karin and the role as fundamental to the success of the DACH market alliance and the wider GroupM EMEA regional strategy.” 

Karin Ross, GroupM CEO DACH & Germany, adds, “I am already very proud of the work of our colleagues in Switzerland, Austria and Germany. Our diverse talents, with their extensive knowledge of the respective local media landscape and cultural trends, are a great asset to our client that we will continue to cultivate. In addition, I firmly believe that the combination of the skills capabilities and experience of our people from all three countries will lead to even better communications solutions for our customers. 

We have been working together successfully on a DACH level for quite some time now, which allows us to provide relevant offerings such as Connected TV or Sustainable Media solutions to customers in all three countries.” 

Andreas Vretscha, GroupM CEO Switzerland and Austria, adds, “In addition to the size of GroupM, I am especially proud of the multi-faceted nature of our agencies. This results in a great combination of broad expertise across all communication channels paired with absolute implementation competence. Especially in the entire digital ecosystem, the further deepening of the collaboration at DACH level opens up excellent opportunities. We can offer our clients the best solutions in every digital discipline, whether individually or cross-channel. 

I am very pleased to be working with Karin and my colleagues in the DACH Executive Commitee to drive innovations from which Switzerland and Austria can now benefit even faster. With the combined forces of our employees throughout the DACH region, we will implement our vision to “Make advertising work better for people”.