Michael Kassan isn’t called the “King of Cannes” for nothing. The founder and chief executive of strategic advisory firm 3C Ventures has been coming to Cannes Lions for 26 years – and remembers when the event was just an awards ceremony with a few parties thrown by ad agencies.
With Kassan’s help, the event has roared through the ages bringing creatives, marketers, media brands, tech giants and celebrities to the French seaside town.
Kassan spoke to The Post about the evolution of Cannes Lions, the challenges facing the industry and how 3CV works with clients to thrive in today’s fast-paced, ever-changing environment.
Q: You founded 3C Ventures in 2024, after having spent decades advising the biggest media and marketing companies. What gaps in the market has 3CV been uniquely positioned to fill?
Michael Kassan: Leadership teams have always dealt with complexity. What feels different today is the pace of change and the degree of interconnectedness across the business, much of it accelerated by AI.
Technology, consumer behavior, media, commerce, talent, and economics are all evolving simultaneously, often in ways that influence one another. A decision in one area can quickly create implications across several others.
That’s where 3C Ventures comes in. We built the firm around an operator’s lens — a team of seasoned executives who have run businesses, managed growth, and delivered results through transformation. We don’t view strategy as the finish line. We spend as much time focused on implementation, partnerships, and execution as we do on the recommendation itself. In a market where so many decisions have become interconnected, our role is helping leaders translate insight into action and create tangible business outcomes.
Q: What specific industry problems are your clients asking you to help solve?
MK: The question we hear most often is simple: “What should we do now?”
That can mean a lot of things. It can mean rethinking an agency model, building an AI plan that connects to the business, evaluating a media or technology partner, sharpening a go-to-market strategy, designing a better marketing organization, or figuring out where a brand should show up in culture.
There’s a lot of complexity in the market right now, and a lot of language that sounds more sophisticated than it is. Every company is being sold a platform, a dashboard, a transformation or a promise of efficiency. Our clients want help separating substance from theater.
They want to know what matters, what can wait, who they should trust, and how to turn a strategic choice into something that works inside their business.
Q: Your company balances advisory work with investment opportunities and strategic partnerships – what sorts of opportunities and partnerships do you look for, and why?
MK: We look for opportunities where the need is clear, the leadership is strong, and the business has a reason to matter.
A good partnership should create momentum for both sides. It should help a company reach customers, build credibility, open a new market, strengthen a product, or accelerate growth in a way it couldn’t do alone.
We’re especially interested in businesses that sit at the intersection of technology and human behavior. That’s where the market is moving. The best companies in this space understand the tools, but they also understand people: how they spend time, what earns their attention, what builds trust, and what makes them act.
Technology can get you into the conversation. Trust and execution keep you there.
Q: Which sectors within media, marketing, sports, entertainment and tech are you most bullish on through the lens of 3CV?
MK: I’m bullish on businesses that sit close to attention, commerce, identity and culture.
Commerce media is one of the most interesting areas because the distance between discovery and purchase keeps shrinking. Consumers can see something, consider it and buy it in the same environment. That changes the role of media and changes what brands need from partners.
Sports also have enormous momentum. In a fragmented media world, sports still delivers live attention, community, emotion and scale. That combination is rare, and marketers understand its value.
I’m also interested in creator-led businesses, modern measurement, identity infrastructure, AI-enabled workflows and companies that help marketers make better decisions with the data they already have. The common thread is usefulness. The market needs a clear set of tools, partners, and ideas that solve real problems.
Q: What does 3CV have planned this year at Cannes Lions?
MK: For us, Cannes has always been about convening. Bringing marketers, media executives, founders, creators, athletes, entertainment leaders, technology companies, and agency leaders together in one place to create opportunities that wouldn’t otherwise exist. New partnerships are formed, strategic relationships are strengthened, ideas are challenged, and business gets done.
This year, 3C Ventures has an expanded presence anchored by PLAGE 3CV, our flagship seaside destination for the week. We designed it as a place where meaningful conversations lead to meaningful outcomes: part hospitality and networking, part thought leadership platform, and part meeting ground for business development.
PLAGE 3CV hosts curated hospitality experiences, including The Chef’s Table, an intimate dining series with Michelin-starred guest chefs and fragrance workshops, Le Bistro, our Mediterranean-style beachfront pop-up, and daily happy hours hosted by Zeta Global.
At the center of it is CONVENE at PLAGE 3CV, our programming series. The week covers culture, commerce, creators, fandom, sports, AI and the changing relationship between brands and consumers. We have leaders from companies across the ecosystem joining us for conversations designed to be lively, specific, and useful.
We also hosted the annual 3CONVENE Executive Dinner with Disney, at Hotel du Cap on Monday evening. Later that night, we co-hosted the iHeartMedia After Dark Celebration with Condé Nast and Capital One, also at Hotel du Cap, with a special DJ set by Questlove.
For us, Cannes is about proximity. The more fruitful conversations rarely happen by accident, but they do need the right setting.
Q: What are the biggest issues marketers are talking about at Cannes Lions this year – and what topics are still getting too little attention?
MK: AI will dominate the week. So will commerce + retail media, sports, creators, measurement,, and the evolving agency model. Those are all important. But for me, the more interesting question is how companies have to change in response.
AI can make organizations faster, but speed only helps if the organization knows where it’s going. A lot of companies still have decision-making structures, approval processes, talent models, and partner ecosystems built for a slower market. That’s the part that deserves more attention. The technology conversation is ahead of the operating model conversation.
Marketers are also thinking hard about trust. Consumers are moving through more channels, more platforms, and more forms of content than ever. The more successful brands will use technology to become more relevant and more useful, while still feeling human.
Q: AI is reshaping every aspect of advertising and content creation. Which areas of the industry are most vulnerable to disruption and which have become more valuable and benefited from AI?
MK: Every conversation about AI starts with efficiency, and efficiency matters. AI will make many tasks faster and cheaper: production, reporting, versioning, analysis, optimization and parts of planning.
The larger shift is around value. For decades, a lot of the industry was built around producing things: plans, reports, assets, decks, content, recommendations. AI increases the supply of all of that. When supply increases, value moves toward the things that are harder to automate.
Judgment matters more. Taste matters more. Originality matters more. The ability to ask the right question matters more. The ability to understand a brand, a customer, a cultural moment and a business problem at the same time becomes incredibly valuable.
AI will change the mechanics of creativity and media. It will also make great human judgment easier to spot.
Q: How do you think the role of the modern CMO has changed over the last five years – and what skills matter most?
MK: The CMO role has become one of the most complicated jobs in the C-suite. Just a few years ago, the job centered on brand, media, growth, and customer experience. Those responsibilities haven’t gone away. Now, the CMO also needs to understand data, technology, AI, commerce, privacy, measurement and how marketing connects to the broader business model.
The best CMOs are “translators”. They can sit with the CEO and talk about growth, with the CFO and talk about returns, with the CTO and talk about systems, with creative teams and talk about ideas and with consumers through the work itself.
That requires range. It also requires curiosity, because the job keeps changing. The CMOs I admire most don’t pretend to have every answer. They know how to ask better questions and build teams that can keep learning.
Q: We have already seen a ton of media and advertising consolidation in recent years, and more is expected. What separates successful media acquisitions from deals that look good on paper but ultimately fail?
MK: Most acquisitions make sense on announcement day. The story is usually clean: scale, efficiency, complementary capabilities, expanded reach. I think the hard part starts after the press release.
A good acquisition needs a clear view of how the combined company will create more value for clients, customers, talent, and shareholders. That means leadership alignment, cultural fit, a real integration plan, and a clear understanding of which capabilities matter most.
Cost savings can support a deal, but that can’t be the whole story. Long-term value usually comes from better products, stronger talent, better distribution, better data, sharper strategy, or a more compelling market position.
Deals are financial transactions, but companies are human systems. The numbers may get a deal signed, but it’s the people who determine whether it works.
Q: Television is going through a major disruption as viewers continue to flock to streaming and social media platforms – if you were in charge of a major TV network, what steps would you take to better position your company for growth?
MK: I’d begin by expanding the definition of the business. A major TV network has programming, talent, intellectual property, live events, advertising relationships, audience trust, and cultural relevance. Those assets can travel across many environments if the company builds for that reality.
The priority would be creating a stronger audience business. That means investing in franchises, live programming, sports, creators, and formats that can move across streaming, social, live experiences, and commerce.
I would also prioritize stronger data and advertising products. Marketers want premium environments, but they also want better targeting, better measurement, and clearer outcomes.
Consumers don’t think in channels anymore. They think in moments, shows, personalities, clips, games, and conversations. So that means media companies have to build around the way people actually behave.
Q: If you were launching a media or marketing company from scratch today, what would you prioritize first: technology, talent, data, distribution or something else – and why?
MK: I’d start with talent and a clear reason to exist. Technology matters. Data matters. Distribution matters. But great people make the critical choices about how those pieces come together.
The tools become available to everyone over time. The advantage comes from judgment, creativity, speed, relationships, and the discipline to focus on a real customer need. A new company today has to be built with technology and data in its foundation, of course. But the first question I’d ask is: who is this for, and why will they care? If you can answer that clearly, you can build. If you can’t, no technology stack will save you.
Q: You’ve been to Cannes Lions for over 25 years. How has the festival evolved and what do you still look forward to every year?
MK: Cannes started as a festival to celebrate great advertising. Today, it’s a global gathering around attention, culture, technology, entertainment, commerce and business.
The audience has expanded dramatically, and the conversations have expanded with it. You still have the creative community, which is essential to Cannes, but you also have platforms, publishers, athletes, creators, founders, entertainment companies, agencies, marketers, and technology leaders all in the same place.
What I still enjoy is the energy of the week. You can feel what the industry cares about before it shows up in a formal report. You hear which questions keep coming up. You see which companies have momentum. You meet people who end up shaping your year.
Cannes is intense, but it remains profoundly useful because it compresses the industry into one week … And no one is complaining about the backdrop.
