Creative and media agency MERGE Chicago has promoted Michael Matykiewicz to Executive Creative Director. The role was formerly occupied by Kevin Houlihan, who is now MERGE’s president and chief creative officer.
Matykiewicz, who was formerly SVP/creative director, works on the agency’s Blue Cross Blue Shield, Marco’s, MB Financial Bank and Village Inn accounts. He is known for his ability to move across businesses easily and capture the distinct voice of each brand.
Prior to joining the MERGE team, Matykiewicz worked at Houlihan Madison Most, an agency that was purchased by HY Connect, which was folded into MERGE. He began his career in account management at Leo Burnett before moving to the creative side at agencies Laughlin Constable and Chicago Creative Partnership.
President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday named Brendan Carr, the senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission, as the new chairman of the agency tasked with regulating broadcasting, telecommunications and broadband.
Carr is a longtime member of the commission and served previously as the FCC's general counsel. He has been unanimously confirmed by the Senate three times and was nominated by both Trump and President Joe Biden to the commission.
The FCC is an independent agency that is overseen by Congress, but Trump has suggested he wanted to bring it under tighter White House control, in part to use the agency to punish TV networks that cover him in a way he doesn't like.
Carr has of late embraced Trump's ideas about social media and tech. Carr wrote a section devoted to the FCC in " Project 2025," a sweeping blueprint for gutting the federal workforce and dismantling federal agencies in a second Trump administration produced by the conservative Heritage Foundation.
Trump has claimed he doesn't know anything about Project 2025, but many of its themes have aligned with his statements.
Carr said in a statement congratulating Trump on his win that he believed "the FCC will have an important role to play reining in Big Tech, ensuring that broadcasters operate in the public interest, and unleashing economic growth."
"Commissioner Carr is a warrior for Free Speech, and has fought against the regulatory Lawfare that has stifled Americans' Freedoms, and held back our Economy," Trump said in a statement on Sunday. "He will end the regulatory onslaught that has been crippling America's Job Creators and Innovators, and ensure that the FCC delivers for rural America."
The five-person commission has a 3-2 Democratic... Read More
