Australia – Havas Media Group in Australia , the media division of global marketing and communications group Havas, has promoted Francis Coady, former general manager of Havas Sports and Entertainment, to the newly created role of chief marketing officer.
Coady is an entertainment veteran with 20 years of experience working across various industries such as music, film, partnership, and content, as well as media, and marcoms. He has previously established the Havas Sports and Entertainment division, building it into a multimillion dollar-billing operation. Coady has won large-scale clients and produced award-winning campaign work for brands such as Gillette, LG, and Virgin, as well as Red Bull, and Destination NSW, among others.
Prior to joining Havas five years ago, Coady has previously worked as a director at management consultancy firm The Coady Group, where he managed artists including Thirsty Merc and Hi-5. He has also created and spent 13 years producing the Bondi Short Film Festival.
In his new role, Coady will be responsible for all internal and external marketing and communications, and existing client and new business relations. He will also be overseeing creative content media campaigns.
Commenting on his appointment, Coady said, “Our job as marketing professionals is to entertain, engage, and educate. The last five years working at Havas Media have given me the opportunity to bring this philosophy to life, with the support of incredible leadership, a smart, empathetic team, which has fostered a culture that is always focused on doing work with meaning.”
Meanwhile, Havas Media Group CEO Virginia Hyland shared that Coady has made an outstanding contribution to their business after building the specialist sports and entertainment division from scratch.
“The creation of the CMO position not only recognizes Francis’ exceptional track record over the past five years, but it will also enable us to leverage his broad cross-industry expertise to grow the agency and the strength of our amazing client partnerships,” said Hyland.
A formal announcement on Coady’s internal replacement will be communicated shortly.