The Fight Over the Future of Commercial Production | Steve Davies (APA) and Matt Miller (AICP)

What happens when the agency advising a client on who should produce its advertising also has a financial interest in producing the work itself?

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In this special episode of Technically Creative, Orlando Wood sits down with Steve Davies, CEO of the UK’s Advertising Producers Association (APA), and Matt Miller, President and CEO of the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP), to discuss the growing fight over WPP, in-house agency production, independent production companies, competitive bidding, and the future of commercial production.

The conversation follows a WPP memo encouraging agencies to move production toward WPP Production and offering guidance on how to respond when clients request competitive bids. The memo has triggered a major reaction across the advertising production industry.

Steve and Matt make an important distinction: agencies can produce and compete for work. The issue is whether an agency can fairly compete for that work while also influencing the process that determines who wins it.

That opens up a wider conversation about the traditional triple-bid system, conflicts of interest, transparency, pricing, talent, and what genuine competition provides to advertisers.

They also explore the role independent production companies play in discovering and developing directors, investing in creative talent, and supporting careers across production, editing, VFX, and music. As holding companies build larger internal production capabilities, what happens to the ecosystem that develops the next generation of talent?

The conversation also looks at generative AI, changing advertising economics, the growth of social content, pressure on holding companies, and how independent production companies are adapting as the commercial production business changes.

We explore:

Why the WPP production memo caused such a strong industry reaction

In-house agency production and potential conflicts of interest

Why the triple-bid system matters to advertisers