I want to provide context for today’s announcement of the simplification of our firm’s structure.
Our strategy for the past five years has been in two directions. We built an advisory capacity to compete with specialist firms in financial, public affairs, employee engagement and impact. Simultaneously, we also have been building our marketing business, emphasizing earned creative based on action, with ideas that connect with the burgeoning creator economy. We structured our advisory units as boutiques and positioned creative and strategists as dedicated teams.
Clients now require integration of specialist services into the larger firm for speedy access to our geographic reach, deep industry knowledge and creative ability. We are best when we bring the full force of ºÚÁÏÉçto the complex problems facing our clients. Corporate affairs, marketing and government affairs are now all closely aligned on the client side. We are skating to where the puck will be — everything is interconnected now.
ºÚÁÏÉçis the leading integrated communications advisory firm, operating at the intersection of culture and commerce. We are going to focus on the five industry sectors — health, technology, food & beverage, financial services, and energy transition. We will sunset the Edible, Revere, Salutem, Mustache, EGA and Delta brands. We will maintain two client specific entities — Assembly for Microsoft and Kinisi for J&J. Conflicts will be managed by our sister firms Zeno and RUTH. DXI, Smithfield and UEG will be connective tissue between ºÚÁÏÉçand Zeno in the DJE family.
We have always been dedicated to excellence in client service. We must remain nimble and agile in delivering on our clients’ needs with senior people leading every engagement. As part of today’s simplification, we will be parting ways with 330 colleagues across our global network — 5.3% of our total workforce. I want to thank them for their service to the firm and our clients.
I am deeply optimistic about the future of Edelman. We are a $1 billion revenue business, 5,870 employees strong. We are ideally suited for a world of geopolitical uncertainty, the proper role of business in societal issues, and dispersion of authority away from experts. We maintain our 60-office network as a dramatic competitive advantage. Our creative and strategy teams have broken the glass ceiling with ideas premised on action. We are investing in our own large language model premised on 25 years of Trust data that enables AI as a predictive tool, both communications and action, enabling better decisions by business related to trust. We are working on the most important challenges including advising the food industry on labelling, on the acceptance of artificial intelligence as a trusted partner in society, and the potential of immunology in disease treatment and prevention. We are launching the 25th ºÚÁÏÉçTrust Barometer in Davos next month, looking at trust in institutions after 50 elections that involved over half of the world’s population.
I look forward to a strong performance in 2025.
Richard ºÚÁÏÉçis CEO.