Secure your brand's future growth

The world's leading brands, the best advertising, is built on understanding human life.

That won't change. 

But right now, there's tension in the air as AI creates the possibility that marketing could be driven by machines. 

A multi-billion dollar question hangs over our industry: what's the role of people during the next decade of brand guardianship and brand growth? 

Some believe the answer is ‘nothing’. 

We believe it should be ‘everything’.

Human behaviour is irrational, emotional, gloriously unpredictable.

Understanding it takes human intuition, human creativity, human judgement. Removing human leadership and insight would be an unprecedented gamble. 

But brand leaders do need AI. They need game-changing technology to help replace doubt with certainty.

They need measurable outcomes. Data-driven proof.  

They need to be able to supercharge their brands and their teams. 

We are at an inflection point when marketers must balance the pressure and opportunity to harness AI with the need to keep marketing human. 

How do the best people in our industry navigate this moment? 

How are they using technology to enhance, rather than replace, their expertise? How are they combining gut instinct with data, creativity with certainty, art with science? 

Because when you put talented people in control of powerful tools, something extraordinary happens. 

The data reveals insights that a great strategist transforms into breakthroughs. 

Testing gives teams the confidence to be bolder. 

The human-serving AI helps talented teams move faster, think bigger, achieve more. 

And then rather than machines replacing people, the future is about exceptional people using an era-defining technology to do their best work ever. 

At the Future of Brands 2026, we're celebrating the people who are showing us how. 

The ones proving that you don't have to choose between creativity and certainty. Between inspiration and evidence. Between bold ideas and guaranteed results. 

The creatives who are mastering AI. The strategists who use new data signals to fuel their imaginations. The leaders who understand that our industry's superpower has always been, and always will be, its people. 

Like you, this event lives amidst this tension.

More detailed themes coming soon.