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Matt Williams

The acquisition accelerates international digital experience and tech powerhouse – MSQ DX – in America, building further scale and capability to support MSQ’s market-leading multi-disciplinary offer.

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Today we are further expanding our presence in North America and building out our international digital experience and tech powerhouse – MSQ DX – with the acquisition of Atlanta-based digital experience company, Arke.
MSQ officially launched MSQ DX last month, uniting our existing digital experience agencies – 26 DX, MMT, and UDG – under a single, scalable global framework with integrated leadership and a unified brand. The world’s first digital impact company, MSQ DX, delivers AI-powered, data-driven customer experiences across digital product design, martech, ecommerce and operational modernization. It measures success by translating digital experiences into client outcomes – revenue growth, operational efficiency and competitive advantage.
The addition of Arke significantly strengthens MSQ DX’s North American footprint, adding an 80-person team headquartered in Atlanta and an advanced delivery hub in Florianópolis, Brazil. This aligns with MSQ DX’s deep capabilities across the UK and Europe, creating a connected network of 600 digital experts generating $80M+ in revenue and serving leading global brands including Porsche, Bosch, Vodafone, Caesars Entertainment and the CFA Institute.
Arke’s integration not only expands MSQ DX’s scale and reach, it also unlocks broader opportunities for multi-disciplinary services to MSQ clients in North America (such as Chase, Mars, Booking.com, and Coca-Cola), while providing Arke’s own clients with access to MSQ’s world-class creative and performance expertise through its New York hub and beyond.
The move builds on our ongoing growth in the U.S., following last year’s acquisition of New York-based creative agency SPCSHP which doubled our U.S. presence and increased revenues to $100m. The addition of a base in Brazil now allows MSQ to explore opportunities to expand our capabilities into South America.
Founded in 2005, Arke has built a respected reputation in the digital consulting ecosystem, blending bold UX vision, engineering precision and scalable martech, tripling its revenues in the past three years to $15m. Its work has fuelled exponential growth and operational efficiency for businesses in the restaurant, travel and hospitality, retail and financial services industries such as Chick-fil-A, Inspire Brands, Hersheypark and Equifax. Arke has earned a spot on the #Inc5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies in America.
Eric Stoll, Arke’s founder and CEO will join MSQ DX’s global leadership that includes Florian Frey, Mathias Reinhardt and Rebecca Crook and, together with his management team, will lead the digital experience business in America. The rebrand of Arke to MSQ DX will be phased over the coming months.
Arke’s team will join MSQ’s 1,850 worldwide colleagues working across thriving multi-disciplinary hubs of scale in North America, Europe and Asia where entrepreneurial agencies can collaborate, fusing together data, tech and creativity to bring joined-up thinking and deliver brand momentum for clients by harnessing broader skills in MSQ’s New York hub and beyond.
Arke deepens MSQ’s strong relationships with leading technology platforms – building on our 20+ year relationship with Optimizely in the U.S. and bringing added strength through its partnership with Contentstack, where Arke is one of just four Elite Partners globally and was recently named 2025 Agency Partner of the Year.
Peter Reid, Group CEO of MSQ, commented: “Arke is a brilliant addition to the growing MSQ family and further accelerates a number of strategically important points in our growth plans – building out our presence in North America, further delivering on our vision to create a global digital experience and tech powerhouse and bringing the interesting dynamic of a near-shoring facility in Brazil where we will look at expanding out our capabilities.
“By harnessing the combined skills of Eric and the wider Arke team with those in our New York hub, we bring greater depth and breadth in the scope of services we can offer in North America – a compelling and beneficial integrated offering to existing clients and to the wider market.”
Eric Stoll, founder and CEO of Arke, said: “We’ve always believed in building for what’s next. MSQ’s multi-disciplinary structure, cultural alignment and global reach make this the right inflection point for our next chapter – accelerating our ability to deliver next generation AI-powered digital experiences at scale.
“Arke is now positioned to lead digital transformation initiatives across the full customer lifecycle, from strategy through loyalty, harnessing MSQ’s broader integrated capabilities across MSQ’s data, media, creative and production network.”
Eric Stoll will work closely with MSQ’s Executive Director Ben Rudman and MSQ’s North America President Aaron Lang.
MSQ’s Executive Director Ben Rudman, added: “We are already seeing the strong cultural fit between our businesses through the many opportunities we are jointly exploring.
“With Arke following hot on the heels of the UDG acquisition and with around 600 people now working across digital experience and tech, we are building out our global powerhouse vision.”
Acquiring Arke marks the latest move in MSQ’s U.S. expansion plans. In the last two years SPCSHP (creative), MSQ Sport + Entertainment (sport and entertainment marketing), Smarts (PR and creative), M3 Labs (creative production agency) and Walk-In Media (full service media) have joined established sister agencies The Gate (creative and CRM), Stein (B2B media) and Elmwood (branding and design) in the U.S. under the MSQ portfolio.
Earlier this year MSQ acquired London-based insights-led strategy and innovation consultancy The Forge, connected commerce agency PRECIOUS Media and AI-led global production agency Wooshii.
Find out more about <a href="https://www.msqdx.com/en">MSQ DX here &gt;</a>

MSQ Expands Further into Americas with Acquisition of Atlanta-based Arke

After careful consideration, market research, and watching what happened to HBO Max, our creative agency SPCSHP announced today it will return to its original name: Big Spaceship.

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After careful consideration, market research, and watching what happened to HBO Max, our creative agency SPCSHP announced today it will return to its original name: Big Spaceship.&nbsp;
“People just kept calling us Big Spaceship anyway”, said CEO Taryn Crouthers. “Internally, externally, everyone just kept saying Big Spaceship. And after extensive A/B testing, we discovered people overwhelmingly prefer knowing how to pronounce your name”.
The name restoration comes after the agency realised that removing vowels from your name does not, in fact, do anything but confuse people.&nbsp;
The decision was also driven by strategic considerations. As part of the global MSQ group, Big Spaceship needed a name that could translate across languages and markets. SPCSHP, it turns out, does not translate. In any language.
When informed of the change, one client said: “Oh, thank goodness – we love the team and the work, but that name...” Another admitted they'd been writing “Big Spaceship” in emails for two years, hoping it would magically change back.
While the name change may look cosmetic from the outside, the return to Big Spaceship reflects something more substantive happening inside the agency.
<h3>Business Rationale</h3>
Big Spaceship is built for exploration: new creative territory, new ways of working, and, evidently, new names. The 25-year-old agency, founded by Michael Lebowitz, has always been at the forefront of what’s next. Case in point: Harvard Business Review has featured Big Spaceship in two case studies, examining how it built and scaled through a distinctive culture that fuses innovation, creativity, and strategy.
“Today, creative needs to flex in real time. This moment requires so much more than the predictable campaign of a TV spot with matching luggage”, said Crouthers. “Brands need a partner who can deliver integrated work and native storytelling at scale, without sacrificing craft. Big Spaceship is uniquely designed to meet this moment”. Over the past year, Big Spaceship and parent company MSQ have built a tech-enabled infrastructure that can plug into partners’ operating model and uses a “creative spine” that learns and improves with every project.
The agency is also offering Explore Pods. These short, focused sprints allow partners to hire Big Spaceship to solve specific creative challenges. The pods combine strategy, creative, production, and technology instead of the traditional linear and siloed creative process. This approach allows for deliverables in days or weeks instead of months and at a more efficient investment. Speaking of efficiency: keeping your original name costs $0.&nbsp;
<h3>A New Creative Frontier</h3>
With a new-old name comes a new-old Chief Creative Officer: Steve Street. He has been with the agency since 2016, most recently serving as SVP, Executive Creative Director. During his time there, Steve has led creative across Big Spaceship’s most ambitious work. He was on PTO when the last rebrand launched.
“Steve has been architecting Big Spaceship's creative vision as a senior member of the team for nearly 10 years. He’s building our tech-enabled creative team, delivering brilliant work, and cultivating a culture where ambition and kindness coexist. That combination is rare, and it's exactly what Big Spaceship and the industry at large needs right now”, said Crouthers.
“Under this new infrastructure, Big Spaceship can bring ideas to life in ways that simply didn't exist before, unlocking new forms of storytelling and brand experience”, said Street. “The agencies that will lead the next decade are the ones who can see around corners and move faster. That's exactly where we live”.
The agency also has two proprietary cultural listening tools: Internet Brunch, a daily newsletter read by 10,000+ marketers, and Reveal, a generational insights platform. Both help clients see shifts in culture and behavior before they become obvious.
The agency’s new brand platform and website launch today at BigSpaceship.com.&nbsp;
For more information, Google "Big Spaceship." See how easy that is?&nbsp;

Big Spaceship Returns to Big Spaceship Name After Realising SPCSHP Was “Kind of Hard to Say”