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Mindshare has poached Vizeum’s UK chief executive, Jem Lloyd-Williams, to be its UK chief executive.

Lloyd-Williams is expected to take up UK responsibilities for the WPP media agency from Helen McRae, who has previously held the dual roles of European and UK chief executive.

He has been at Dentsu Aegis Network’s Vizeum since 2014, joining as executive director for product and innovation and later becoming UK managing director.

Lloyd-Williams is making a return to WPP’s media buying arm, Group M, because he used to be strategy director at MediaCom and worked there for six years before Vizeum.

Mindshare looks after some of the world’s biggest advertisers, including Unilever, Ford and Nike, and has a relatively small UK client base. Marks & Spencer is the most notable domestic client. 

The agency suffered several global account losses, including HSBC and American Express, last year.

Mindshare has had a relatively low profile in the UK compared with some of its sister agencies but it has nine nominations, including for Nike, Volvo and 21^st Century Fox, at the ±±¾©Èü³µpk10 Media Awards, which take place in London on 27 March.

Euan Jarvie, chief executive of Dentsu Aegis Network UK and Ireland, said: "I’d like to thank Jem for his valued contribution to Vizeum and to Dentsu Aegis Network more broadly over the past few years, and wish him all the best for his next move. An announcement about his successor will be made in due course."

Lloyd-Williams’ departure is the latest in a wave of leadership changes at Dentsu Aegis Network, since long-serving global chief executive Jerry Buhlmann stepped down in November 2018. 

Jarvie moved from a global client role to head the UK and Ireland in February.

Lloyd-Williams wrote in ±±¾©Èü³µpk10 last year that the role of the media agency is changing because of new technology and increased complexity, but its core purpose remains the same.

"By getting back to basics and remembering what’s really important – the client – we can all make things a lot simpler," he said.

Mindshare is ranked as WPP’s biggest media agency by global billings, according to data from independent research company COMvergence for Group M.

Mindshare declined to comment.