Steve Simpson

Steve Simpson is a highly regarded advertising technology executive with a career spanning programmatic media, data-driven advertising, and creative effectiveness. He is best known for his senior leadership roles within GroupM and Xaxis, where he helped shape the evolution of programmatic buying and audience-based advertising strategies across global markets. His expertise sits at the intersection of media technology, commercial strategy, and creative performance — making him a respected voice in the industry's ongoing effort to treat creative quality as a measurable, optimisable variable rather than a matter of taste. In June 2026, Simpson joined the Board of Advisors at DAIVID, the AI-powered creative effectiveness platform founded and led by CEO Ian Forrester. DAIVID uses computer vision, facial coding, and machine learning to measure the emotional resonance and attention value of advertising creative at scale. Simpson's appointment reflects his alignment with the platform's mission to quantify creative quality and connect it directly to media performance outcomes — a cause he has championed throughout his career. Throughout his time in AdTech, Simpson has been associated with the maturation of programmatic advertising from a niche trading mechanism into a mainstream media discipline. His advisory work at DAIVID represents a natural extension of his career focus: ensuring that the creative dimension of advertising receives the same rigorous, data-driven scrutiny as media planning and buying.

Last updated Jul 10, 2026 by ATDb automated enrichment · Connections updated Jul 13, 2026