User:GRedgrave from AKQA/History draft

History
AKQA was founded in the United Kingdom in 1994, as the Internet boom was beginning. Ajaz Ahmed launched the firm at age 21 after leaving university before graduating, as he wanted to start a multimedia business quickly while interest in the web was increasing. The agency initially focused on digital projects, including product development. One of AKQA's early clients was Virgin, for which the agency designed the first website capable of broadcasting live radio over the Internet for Virgin Radio. Other initial clients included Microsoft, McDonalds, BMW, and Coca-Cola. As it grew in the late 1990s, it added capabilities including a consultancy arm, to meet with client demand for Internet strategy consulting. By 1999, it was ranked as the largest independent new media agency in the United Kingdom, and had been valued at £26 million.

In 2001, the company received an investment of $71 million from Accenture and merged with three other agencies to expand internationally. The London-based agency, then known as AKQA New Media, merged with Citron Haligman Bedecarré in San Francisco, Magnet Interactive in Washington, D.C., and The AndInc in Singapore. The merger led to the formation of AKQA as an international marketing agency.

Private equity firm General Atlantic acquired a majority stake in AKQA in early 2007. Media reports valued the deal at approximately $250 million. That year, AKQA was reported to be the largest independent digital agency in the world, with approximately 700 employees and revenues of around $99 million.

The firm was listed as one of AdAge's agencies of the decade in 2009. AdAge noted that AKQA had weathered the bursting of the dot-com bubble, growing its staff and remaining independent. Its growth continued through the recession of 2007 to 2009, as it added around 200 employees and opened offices in Berlin and El Salvador by 2010.

WPP acquired a majority stake in the agency in 2012, buying out General Atlantic and taking part of the shares that had been owned by AKQA's management. The total company valuation based on the deal was $540 million. At the time, there had been a trend of marketing holding companies purchasing digital agencies, and AKQA had been considered the largest digital agency that was still independent. AKQA became an autonomous subsidiary of WPP, with Ahmed as its CEO and Bedecarré as Chairman. According to the Financial Times, by the time of WPP's acquisition, AKQA had been named "agency of the year" 19 times, and it had received five Cannes Lions awards within the previous year.

The firm received the Queen's Awards for Enterprise in 2014, in the "Innovation" category for "consistent contribution and outstanding achievement". The following year, the agency won four gold Cannes Lions and had received the most awards of any other UK digital agency at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity 2015.

In November 2020, WPP announced that Grey Group would be merged with AKQA, as part of the holding company's efforts to consolidate its agencies. The AKQA and Grey brands continued to exist separately, and WPP said it planned to combine the companies over time into one resulting agency named AKQA Group. The two agencies had approximately 6,000 employees in 50 countries, and had received a total of around 600 Cannes Lions awards since 2010.