Mother chosen as strategic creative partner

Atom - born digital - the app based* bank that’s set to launch later this year has asked Mother, the world’s largest independent marketing agency, to be their strategic creative partner. The partnership is the result of a competitive pitch and is another critical step towards Atom realising their ambition to breathe new life into banking.

Mother will be Atom’s lead marketing partner across all activity from developing brand strategy to producing a full, integrated creative platform. Mother was chosen for their independence, their creativity and their daring approach to marketing as the perfect partners to help Atom position themselves as the first real alternative to the traditional High Street banks.

A mutual cultural and business understanding, as well as a natural meeting of minds, make the two partners confident in their task to step-change customers’ relationship with money, building a bank with none of the baggage of the past. The brief will initially focus on readying the brand for launch, bringing Atom’s innovative customer-centric and branch-free proposition to life.

Lisa Wood, Atom bank CMO, said “We were looking for a partner who shared our energy and enthusiasm for getting people to reappraise the relationship they have with their money and their bank. In Mother we believe we have found the right partner. We share a start-up mind-set and we both have a relentless passion to challenge the status quo.”

Katie Mackay, Joint Head of Strategy at Mother, said: “Atom bring a seismic shift to the tired world of banking and the opportunity to play a part in disrupting a sector is a hugely attractive marketing challenge, one that rarely comes along. But it wasn’t just Atom’s digitally led, customer-first proposition that attracted us. We had great chemistry with the team from the off.”

ENDS

Atom is an app based bank developing a range of personal and business banking products and services that will be delivered using mobile apps (phone and tablet), with a desktop version to follow.

About Mother London

Mother London is the world’s most respected, independent creative agency at the heart of advertising, experiential, digital, design, and product development. We started around one table with three people, all of whom shared the washing up.

Eighteen years on, Mother has offices in London, New York and Buenos Aires.

We work with iconic brands such as Stella Artois, IKEA, Boots, Unilever, MoneySupermarket.com, the UN and Coca-Cola amongst many others. From fast moving retailers and brands with global scale, to local jewels with local needs; we create ideas that are embraced by popular culture and deliver more powerfully as a result.

Mother’s non-traditional instincts continually create opportunities to engage and inspire consumers, far beyond traditional advertising.

Our competencies include award winning expertise in Creative, Strategy, Design, Experience and Digital, providing a unique set of capabilities seamlessly integrated together as one. Mother ultimately exists to attract the most creative minds in the world, including our clients.

We are an unashamedly curious and passionate group of people who continually strive to better understand brands, their power and their potential. Mother is currently Campaign’s Agency of the Decade and are a multiple APG Strategy Agency of the Year winner bearing testament to the Agency’s excellence in delivering effective and innovative creative.

For more info contact: Charlotte David | charlotte@motherlondon.com | +44(0)7824702854

About Atom

Atom is a start-up bank, not yet launched, but recently authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the PRA.

Founded a year ago and based in the City of Durham, Atom has a growing team of 100 people drawn from across the country, working with partners to bring pioneering technology to Europe for the first time. Atom is building the UK’s first bank designed specifically for digital, offering easy and convenient banking, along with unique and engaging ways to manage money.

The Atom team are highly experienced, having built and run some of the most well respected banks in the UK. CEO Mark Mullen has 25 years experience in the sector and was previously CEO at the multi-award winning telephone and internet bank, first direct. CMO Lisa Wood has 23 years’ experience in building propositions, brand development and financial services marketing, previously Head of Marketing for first direct.

The team are supported by a strong non-exec board, which includes founder and Chairman Anthony Thomson, also the founder and former Chairman at Metro Bank. He is Chairman of the Financial Services Forum, the UK’s leading membership organisation for senior FS industry executives and Chairman of the National Skills Academy for Financial Services, a national charity.

For more information visit atombank.co.uk. Full details of the extent of our authorisation by the PRA can be found on the Financial Services Register.