• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, August 2, 2022

In its latest step to get its financial controls in order, Martin Sorrell-led S4 Capital has added Christopher Martin as Chief Operating Officer while Colin Day has been named the company’s new Audit and Risk Committee Chair.

The appointments follow the company’s struggle earlier this year to get its full-year 2021 financial report issued on time. It was delayed twice due internal auditing problems which S4 chief Sorrell said was “unacceptable and embarrassing” when the report finally was released in May.

The company has also invested in additional financial staff and training and made a CFO switch at the beginning of the year when Mary Basterfield replaced Peter Rademaker. Late last month the company put into place stricter cost controls after lowering its full-year profit outlook but insisted those controls would not affect investments made to improve the firm’s financial operations.

Martin co-founded MightyHive, which merged with S4 in 2018. He is now tasked with improving the firm’s overall organizational structure and processes. Earlier he served at Yahoo for over a decade where he was responsible for post-merger integration of several Yahoo!’s acquisitions.

Sorrell previously worked with Day when he was a director at WPP and Sorrell was CEO. Day joins the S4 board as a non-executive director and succeeds Rupert Faure Walker as chair of the Audit and Risk Committee. Walker remains a member of that committee.

Earlier Day was CEO at plastics and fiber products manufacturer Essentra and served as Chief Financial Officer at both Reckitt Benckiser and Aegis and has served on several boards in addition to WPP.