EY brings CMO offerings and 30+ acquisitions together under EY Studio+

Global consulting firm EY has brought its design, branding, commercial and technology expertise together under one roof. The new 7,000-person strong EY Studio+ will offer a holistic transformation service to its CMO clients around the world.

At the start of 2025, Big Four firm EY sought to reshape narratives around the company – following a period of upheaval and internal change. The “Transformation” campaign by famous marketing advisor Ogilvy, foregrounded the company’s ability to help clients “shape the future”, rather than “be shaped by it”.

Now, EY has rolled out a new way in which it intends to help other companies shape their futures. The freshly launched EY Studio+ promises to provide businesses with “a globally integrated offering that will combine the organisation’s full spectrum of services with the world’s leading talent in design, sales, marketing and customer experience”, helping them to grow their brand and business.

In lay speak, that means EY is gearing up in the marketing space for itself. Comprised of design, sales, marketing, and customer experience technology expertise from various EY-acquired firms (over 30 in total), the move echoes Accenture’s much-heralded entry into the sector over the last decade with Accenture Song.

Among those acquired firms beefing up the credentials of EY Studio+ are Blackdot, Digital Detox, Doberman, etVenture, Fabernovel, Freshworks, Future Friendly, Italia Brand Group, Seren, Team Collective, VODW and Zilker. And this has helped the nascent brand to quickly win key clients, looking to drive growth and transform customer experience across industries.

Examples cited by a press release from EY include “transforming customer service through technology and people for a global retailer”, and “creating differentiated experiences for one of the world’s biggest banks”.

John Rudaizky, EY global chief brand and marketing officer, explained, “EY Studio+ will partner across the C-suite, with particular emphasis on today’s CMOs, who are playing an increasingly pivotal role around the customer experience and an organisation’s growth agenda. One of the most powerful drivers of brand is how customers experience an organisation’s product or service – and that experience is an increasingly fundamental driver of growth. In accelerating this offering, EY is responding to the needs of clients to create new value on a global scale.”

EY Studio+ will also draw on its broad capabilities to help clients shape their adoption of AI across their organisations. According to Laurence Buchanan, who will serve as the global leader of EY Studio+, “Agentic AI has thrust us into a new era of digital transformation.”

Buchanan added, “This is an unprecedented opportunity to redefine what it means to be distinctive, capture market share and increase customer loyalty. But to do so, customer-centric transformation must be rapid, continuous and multi-disciplinary, embracing the combination of creative design, technology and commercial insights.”

The launch of EY Studio+ follows the recent brand expansion of EY-Parthenon, the organization’s strategy and transactions business.