US consultancy Prophet acquires Figtree

Simon Myers, chief executive and co-founder at Figtree says that whether to keep the Figtree name or work under the Prophet name ‘is still under discussion.’

‘We will all be in one office at some point – ideally sooner rather then later,’ says Myers, who says no redundancies are being made as part of the takeover.

Figtree, which was founded in 2004 has offices in London and Hong Kong and around 40 staff.

Prophet is headed up by president Rune Gustafson, has eight offices in the US and Europe including one small office in London, and around 250 staff.

Myers says, ‘We met Gustafson and saw that he shares a similar outlook on the importance of creative thinking, design and strategy, and we both agreed that the future is multi-disciplinary, especially on larger projects.’

The two agencies will dovetail with some overlap around the areas of design, branding and digital according to Myers who says, ‘Prophet are buying Figtree for its creative reputation – design – and we are interested in their analytical research capabilities and marketing.’

Figtree’s location appealed to Prophet as it didn’t have a Hong Kong office, and in London ‘they had one but it was not that well known’, according to Myers.

He says Figtree was attracted to the prospect of a takeover by Prophet ‘as it’s quite a flat structure and not a massive network agency, which appealed to us. It’s a modern structure with an anti-silo mentality.’