Intelligent CXO Issue 67 | Page 30

INTELLIGENT TECHNOLOGY

WPP turns to Kyndryl for major AI transformation

Kyndryl, a leading provider of mission-critical enterprise technology services, and WPP, a trusted growth partner for some of the world’ s leading brands, have announced an expanded agreement under which they will redefine the traditional customer-supplier relationship.

The expanded partnership focuses on three key areas: the transformation of WPP’ s business platforms and support model, an expanded marketing partnership naming WPP as Kyndryl’ s preferred global marketing partner and joint go-to-market initiatives to drive customer growth through modernisation and core business transformation.
“ This partnership redefines the traditional customer-supplier relationship. Kyndryl will help WPP accelerate enterprise transformation through AI-enabled operations, platform modernisation and a simpler technology landscape, while WPP will support Kyndryl’ s growth through an expanded marketing partnership and joint go-to-market innovation,” said Dominic Shine, Chief Information Officer, WPP.“ Together, we are investing in each other’ s success, creating a relationship built on shared outcomes, trust and long-term value creation.”
Business platform transformation for AIpowered modernisation
The Kyndryl Agentic AI Framework will be applied to help modernise WPP’ s application estate with intelligent support operations, faster issue resolution and reduced technical complexity. This will help enable WPP to provide more flexible technology operations in support of its Elevate28 strategy, which aims to modernise its enterprise technology environment to help it become a simpler, more integrated, AI-powered company.
“ By combining enterprise modernisation, AI-enabled operations and customer growth capabilities, we are creating a blueprint that helps WPP transform and innovate faster to drive meaningful outcomes,” said Jonathan Ingram, President, Kyndryl UKI.“ This is helping us unlock new sources of joint value and shared success.”
The new operating model will bring together workplace, cloud, infrastructure and enterprise services under a common, automated operating model. By retiring legacy applications and accelerating adoption of strategic enterprise platforms, WPP expects to realise cost savings and efficiencies over time. A portion of these savings will be reinvested into projects which deliver further IT simplification, productivity and operational benefit and will be further enhanced by the use of Kyndryl Bridge, an AI-powered, open-integration digital business platform to integrate, observe and orchestrate across its entire technology environment.
Global marketing partnership for innovation and growth
Kyndryl has named WPP as its preferred marketing partner, expanding the existing relationship beyond media, brand and creative strategy to encompass a broader portfolio of highvalue digital, experiential and integrated marketing capabilities, alongside the enablement of an AI-powered marketing operating system built on WPP Open, WPP’ s pioneering agentic marketing platform. This expanded partnership across enterprise technology, go-to-market and marketing creates a powerful platform for innovation, growth and business transformation for both WPP and Kyndryl.
Kyndryl Consult and WPP Enterprise Solutions( previously VML Enterprise Solutions) will also continue to strengthen joint goto-market efforts, previously announced in 2025, to drive client growth through modernisation and core business transformation by reimagining how customers engage with brands through the power of AI, data and emerging technology. x
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