Matthew Candy appointed as global leader of IBM iX

Matthew Candy has taken on the role of vice president and global leader for IBM iX, the company’s digital agency network.

Candy previously served as vice president and European leader for IBM iX. Debbie Vavangas will take over Candy’s former responsibilities as digital strategy and iX leader for UK and Ireland while retaining her role as executive partner on the BP account.

In Europe, Sarah Benuit is replacing Peter Kasahara as digital strategy and iX leader for the European region. Benuit, who will be based in Dusseldorf, previously served as general manager of Central and Eastern Europe’s IBM Global Business Services.

In his new role, Candy will report to Paul Papas, IBM’s global leader for digital strategy and iX. He will be based in London but “travel extensively” to oversee a global team of 15,000 employees in 37 studios around the world.

According to IBM, his new role is the result of “significant growth” that IBM iX has experienced since its inception in 2014.

“I’m very excited to take on the role of global leader for IBM iX – we’ve been on a incredible journey over the last few years as we’ve been scaling and growing the business, resulting in us being recognised as one of the leading digital agencies in the world,” he said. “The UK and Europe has been one of our major growth markets. To be able to now bring some of the experiences we have had in scaling the business here, to the other markets, really excites me.”

Last year, Gartner named IBM iX a leader in the global digital marketing agency space, noting that clients give the network “top marks on collaboration, responsiveness and flexibility.” Gartner also stated that clients are pleased with how the network’s creative teams “help challenge their internal teams’ approach to customer-centric marketing.”

Recently, IBM iX partnered with Shell in the UK to test a self-checkout that lets consumers scan numerous items at once and purchase them via an app. According to IBM iX, it takes only five seconds for the instant checkout to complete a transaction for any number of items.

The network also recently partnered with Knorr to create a tool that determines a person’s “flavor personality,” which was built with help from IBM’s Watson cognitive computing team.