ACNE has tapped fellow Swede Jesper Palsson, former CEO and partner at Stopp L.A., to head its U.S. office. Palsson, known for his work for clients such as Google, Lincoln, Chevrolet and Toyota, will help to diversify ACNE from its traditional broadcast and integrated roots into digital space.
“I am very impressed by the work Jesper has done for Stopp and am delighted that he will now join ACNE,” said David Olsson, CEO of ACNE worldwide. “In fact, we have been working to have Jesper on our team for a while, so I’m glad to finally have him on the team.”
Palsson spent several years working on traditional advertising, interactive and direct marketing at various advertising agencies in Sweden before opening up his own design studio. Stockholm-based Stopp recruited him in 2007, when the former post house wanted to open a digital division specializing in interactive and web production. He later moved to Los Angeles, where he worked out of his apartment to eventually transform the West Coast outpost from a dreamy ambition into a respected and profitable production company.
“Moving to ACNE after six years establishing Stopp as a go-to house in the digital space is a natural progression for me,” Palsson said. “With my background and experiences, I feel as though I can make a really strong contribution to a company that clearly values this multidisciplinary identity.”
Palsson plans to strengthen digital capabilities, develop and build upon ACNE’s current roster of directors. “We need to be a little more edgy, aggressive and interesting, and we will soon introduce a whole new, more straightforward and flexible approach to our digital workflow; one that will at once be simpler for our customers and more customizable to their true needs,” Palsson explained.
With offices in Stockholm, Los Angeles, Berlin, Paris and London, ACNE creates commercials, brands, games, TV and features, as well as its own products and brands.
“ACNE is in a very exciting place right now, with our own huge clothing store opening in downtown L.A., steady growth in Berlin and London, the upcoming release of a feature film in Sweden this summer, and a large haul of Lions from Cannes,” ACNE EP Richard Bjorlin said. “With all this momentum and with Jesper joining the ACNE team in the U.S., we think that we have a really exciting time ahead of us.”