Charlotte McEleny talks to Kabeer Chaudhary, global CEO of M&C Saatchi Performance, about the case for staying independent in a consolidating agency market, the network’s mobile-first roots, and why AI-led discovery is changing what visibility means for brands.

Agency consolidation reached new heights in 2025 as Omnicom completed its merger with Interpublic Group, folding six more networks into a single holding company and leaving marketers with an even shorter list of scaled alternatives to choose from. For the networks that stayed outside that wave, the pitch has to rest on what independence delivers.

M&C Saatchi Performance is one of those networks. It started as a mobile marketing agency and now offers omnichannel performance, with its global leadership based in Singapore rather than a traditional Western hub. In this Q&A, Kabeer Chaudhary, global CEO at M&C Saatchi Performance, discusses why independence keeps the agency close to client growth, how the network’s mobile heritage still shapes its thinking, and why AI-driven discovery is forcing marketers to rethink what visibility actually means in 2026.

M&C Saatchi Performance is still proudly an independent network. What value do you think this brings to an agency world that seems to be consolidating more and more?

Independence matters because it keeps us closer to the only thing that should truly matter: the client’s growth. As the agency world consolidates, you inevitably end up with more layers. More internal complexity, more overlapping P&Ls, more people who need to be aligned before a decision can be made. And none of that is evil, but it does create friction. And in a market that moves this quickly, friction is expensive.

Our advantage is that we can move faster. We can make decisions based on what clients need, not on what best fits an internal structure. We can build teams, products`, and solutions around the problem in front of us rather than around legacy silos. The future will not just belong to the largest agencies. It will belong to the agencies that can think clearly, move quickly and use technology without getting trapped inside their own machinery. That is where independence gives us a real edge.

The agency was born from mobile roots; does that still factor into what the agency stands for and the work you do today?

Yes, absolutely. In many ways, our mobile roots are more relevant today than they were when we started. 2026 actually marks our 20th anniversary; we began in 2006 as a mobile marketing agency before expanding into digital and then into omnichannel performance. That gives us a slightly different muscle memory from many agencies that started in traditional media, moved into digital, and are now trying to work out what mobile-first consumer behaviour really means.

For us, mobile was never an add-on. It was the starting point. That matters because in 2026, discovery, consideration, engagement, purchase, and retention are all happening through the device people carry with them all day. Mobile is where brands are found, judged, ignored, loved, deleted, and occasionally forgiven. So yes, our heritage still shapes how we think. It makes us naturally more comfortable with speed, fragmented attention, and the messy reality of how people actually interact with brands today.

How has the business evolved over the years, and how are you staying ahead of the curve for clients?

The business has evolved in the same way consumer behaviour has evolved, messily, quickly, and without asking anyone’s permission.

We started in mobile, then expanded into digital and now work across the full omnichannel journey. But the real evolution has not just been about adding more channels. Every agency can add more logos to a capabilities slide, but the harder part is changing how you think. Marketing today is faster, more fragmented, and far less forgiving than it used to be. Consumers constantly move between platforms, devices, formats, and moods. They discover a brand on TikTok, search for it on Google, compare it on marketplaces, ignore three retargeting ads, read a review, ask a friend, and then convert somewhere completely different. Usually while also watching something else.

So our business has evolved from buying media to solving growth problems across that entire journey. That means stronger data, better measurement, sharper creative thinking, automation, AI-enabled workflows, and a much deeper understanding of how platforms actually behave.

Staying ahead of the curve does not mean chasing every shiny new thing because someone mentioned it at a conference. It means knowing which changes actually matter for clients and which ones are just theatre with a dashboard.

Right now, that means helping clients use AI properly, not just loudly. It means building more integrated teams across media, data, creative, and technology. It means being able to move quickly without losing strategic discipline. And it means keeping one eye on what platforms are telling us while keeping the other firmly on what is actually moving the client’s business.

The agency is also headquartered in Singapore. How does that impact you as a global network?

Many global agency networks still view growth through a fairly traditional Western lens. Our perspective is different because a significant part of our leadership team operates from APAC with Singapore as the hub.

That matters because Singapore sits close to some of the world's most dynamic consumer ecosystems. Mobile-first behaviour, super apps, fintech, travel, e-commerce, and platform-led growth are not abstract future trends here. They are already part of everyday consumer behaviour across this region.

But the bigger point is not geography; it is perspective. Being headquartered in Singapore means we do not see global growth only through the usual old-world centres. We see it from a market that is young, fast, mobile-first, and deeply connected to the next wave of consumer behaviour.

What are the main challenges the agency or clients are facing at the moment and what are you looking at as solutions to this?

The biggest challenge right now is that marketing has become incredibly sophisticated yet harder to read.

Clients have more data than ever, yet many are still asking a very basic question: what is actually working? One of our biggest priorities is helping clients move beyond single-source reporting and towards a more complete view of performance by combining attribution, MMM, and incrementality. Not because any one model is perfect, but because relying on a single dashboard in 2026 is essentially an act of faith.

The second big shift is how AI is changing discovery. For years, brands have been built around getting people to click through to their website. But if AI summaries start answering the question before the click, that changes the game. A brand can look healthy in traditional SEO and still slowly lose visibility in the places where decisions are being shaped. So we are helping clients think beyond classic search and build the kind of authority, content structure, and brand signals that make them visible not just to people but to the machines increasingly filtering information for them.

The third challenge is probably the most human one: focus. There is too much noise, too many tools, too many channels and too many vendors promising transformation. Clients are under pressure to grow, but also to spend more carefully. Our job is to help them separate what matters from what merely sounds impressive.

So the answer is not to chase every new platform or bolt on every new technology; it is to bring more clarity to the system. The problem for the modern marketer is not fewer options; it's that we have too many options and not enough clarity.