SHERIDAN, WYOMING - December 10, 2025 - Monks, S4 Capital's unified, digital-first global brand, is sharpening its AI media strategy in Europe, the Middle East and Africa with the appointment of Thiago Correa as Senior Vice President of Media for EMEA. From his base in London, Correa will help brands redesign their media architectures around algorithmic performance systems that tightly integrate media, data, creative and measurement.
AI as the new engine of media economics
Monks positions Correa's hire squarely in the context of an industry where the leading AI innovators-Google, Meta and Amazon-are also the world's dominant media platforms. As performance increasingly depends on AI-driven bidding and optimisation, the agency sees manual, line-item trading as both a margin sink and a growth constraint for advertisers.
Working closely with these platforms, Monks is scaling AI-powered buying as the default for programmatic channels. Correa's role is to help marketers navigate today's fragmented, "messy middle" of media and ensure their investment strategies are aligned with automated, outcome-focused systems that can learn and adapt in real time.
From siloed workflows to integrated, AI-native systems
Reporting to Executive Vice President of Media Linda Cronin, Correa is charged with helping marketing organisations move from siloed functions to integrated systems in which creative, data and measurement work together.
"L'IA rédéfinit l'économie des médias, en supprimant le milieu manuel où se trouve la majeure partie de la marge", explains Correa. "Les gagnants seront des partenaires intégrés, privilégiant l'automatisation, qui associent la création, les données et les mesures au sein d'un seul et même système. C'est le pari que je fais chez Monks."
For enterprise advertisers, that agenda translates into operating-model change: dismantling traditional agency handoffs, aligning incentives to business outcomes and building teams that can design, test and scale AI-led programmes across markets.
Engineering growth beyond last-click models
Correa's appointment coincides with Monks' push into "growth engineering", an approach to digital media that looks beyond last-click attribution. By repairing data pipelines and injecting high-fidelity, business-relevant signals directly into platforms such as Google and Meta, Monks aims to improve signal quality and, consequently, media performance-without disrupting ongoing buying operations.
This is enabled by the "Fuel & Freedom" methodology, which recognises that algorithmic platforms perform best when fed with diverse, scalable creative. The framework ensures that creative supply matches algorithmic demand, allowing brands to maximise ROI from AI-based ad products like Meta Advantage+ and Google Performance Max while avoiding the friction of traditional organisational silos. Monks also supports clients in moving from classic search to "answer engine optimisation", ensuring brands remain visible wherever AI assistants look for information.
« Nous proposons une feuille de route claire qui prouve la valeur de la première année tout en identifiant l'étape suivante la plus adaptée », adds Correa. « Il ne s'agit pas simplement de faire en sorte que les clients passent à l'IA sans encombre, mais qu'ils l'utilisent pour assurer l'avenir de l'ensemble de leur activité médiatique. »
A transformation leader with deep network experience
Correa brings more than two decades of media and digital transformation experience. At Publicis, he served as Global Client Lead for H&M. Previously, as Head of Digital, Data and Technology at Zenith, he was part of the leadership team recognised as Campaign's Media Agency of the Year 2022. During the same period, he helped build Publicis' UK digital capability via the Performics team, which went on to win PMW's Performance Agency of the Year in 2024.
His track record in integrating digital, data and technology across large, matrixed organisations makes him well placed to operationalise AI-driven media models at scale for Monks' EMEA client base, from global consumer brands to fast-growing digital businesses.
Monks' integrated model for the AI era
For Monks, which has consolidated its production, content, data and media offerings under a single brand and P&L, the hire underlines its ambition to act as a strategic partner for AI-era transformation rather than a traditional media agency.
« Le marketing et les médias se transforment, et je suis ravie que Thiago nous fasse profiter de son expertise de terrain en ce qui concerne l'impact de l'IA sur le paysage médiatique », says Juanita Draude, Senior Vice President EMEA at Monks. « Son expérience aidera Monks à mener à bien la mission qui lui incombe, c'est-à-dire établir une stratégie claire pour aider nos clients à négocier ce virage industriel dans les meilleures conditions, non seulement dans le cadre d'une vision, mais également avec des mesures concrètes. Les médias offrent d'incroyables possibilités de réinventer les pratiques, les processus et les modèles d'entreprise, et Thiago est la figure de proue idéale pour aider nos clients à se transformer. »
As AI continues to reshape media economics, Monks' integrated, cross-vertical model is designed to help brands turn AI from a tactical optimisation tool into a core growth engine across EMEA and beyond.
Learn more about Monks' AI-driven media and growth engineering capabilities at https://monks.com.