UNRVLD buys The Value Engineers and 2CV, adding 70 strategists and researchers

Most digital agencies get handed a strategy and asked to build it. UNRVLD has just bought the people who write the strategy in the first place.

The UK experience and technology group has acquired brand strategy and innovation consultancy The Value Engineers (TVE) and consumer insight firm 2CV, buying both from private equity investor Vespa Capital. Terms were not disclosed. Around 70 strategists, researchers and data specialists join the group.

Two old hands

TVE has 40 years of brand strategy work behind it, with clients including Starbucks, Carlsberg and global gaming brands. It is led by CEO Fleur Horner.

2CV has 37 years of qualitative and quantitative research, teams in London, California and Singapore, and clients such as HP, Coca-Cola and Transport for London. Chris Oatey took over as CEO earlier this year, reports Research Live.

The two were sister businesses under Vespa and had already been sharing clients, a data science capability and a joint approach to new business. Both keep their own leadership, and Horner and Oatey join UNRVLD's executive team.

The buyer

UNRVLD started life in Cardiff in 1999 as Kagool and now has offices in London, Manchester, Cardiff, Leeds and Belfast. BGF backed a management buyout in 2020, and the group has since added Delete, Naveo Commerce and Made to Engage. Its clients include Barratt Redrow, Smeg, Diageo, Crystal Palace FC and Linklaters. Earlier this year it secured a funding package with Barclays to support more deals.

CEO Dan Berry made clear this is not the last one. "This is a deliberate acquisition programme and we have the backing to keep going," he said, as reported by Prolific North.

Why it matters

Clients increasingly want the thinking and the doing under one roof, and this deal joins the two ends. For TVE and 2CV, the appeal is seeing their work turned into something real. Horner told Research Live that "our advice no longer has to stop at the recommendation."

It is also a reminder that PE-owned agencies change hands too. Vespa's exit came through a trade buyer with its own investor and a clear plan, and that is a route plenty of founder-led specialists could follow.

Building something a group like UNRVLD would want? See what buyers are looking for at Agencies.co.

Sources: UNRVLD, Prolific North, Research Live