Jim Messina, who ran Barack Obama's 2012 re-election campaign and has since become one of Washington, DC’s most successful political and corporate advisors, is rebranding and expanding his firms to the UK.
The Messina Group announced that it is rebranding as Fortius Global (‘Fortius’) and launching a new political campaigns practice called MCM². Both are opening an office in London as significant new challengers to strategic advisory and public affairs firms across the continent.
The move brings a campaign-led approach to a market where clients have traditionally had to choose between firms that advise and firms that execute. Fortius and MCM² are promising an integrated strategy-to-execution delivery model that not only informs but gets things done.
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“Fortius fights for the ideas that move the world forward,” said Jim Messina, CEO of Fortius. “We built this firm to carry forward the innovation and the culture from the 2012 Obama re-election campaign, and now under Fortius, our team can help clients tackle more complex challenges across more disciplines and geographies. For more than a decade, the Messina name carried our mission, but our success has always been driven by the extraordinary partners and people who bring that mission to life every day. Fortius reflects the firm we've become, the global ambitions we share, and the collective strength of the team building our future.”
Fortius is built for companies whose growth depends on decisions made by others. For many sectors, the difference between success and failure can come down to a regulator’s ruling, a Minister’s decision, or a vote in Parliament. Plenty of firms tell their clients what the government might do. Fewer are able to help secure the right outcome. Fortius does both.
The UK expansion comes as technological advances and political change reshape the business environment. Artificial intelligence, digital finance, and healthcare breakthroughs, to name just a few, are reshaping entire industries and reordering the rules that govern them.
As part of the rebrand, Greenbrier, the strategic communications and public affairs firm acquired by TMG in 2017, will move completely into Fortius. Communications now spans policy, regulatory strategy, GEO and SEO, and creator-driven media, and Fortius is built to cover all of it. Bringing Greenbrier into the Fortius platform means clients get one integrated team.
Fortius’ premise is that winning in regulated, highly competitive markets takes more than having superior technology or products. It takes a strategy that aligns business objectives, policy realities, and public opinion. Fortius applies the tactics of political campaigns - clear benchmarks, rigorous data, sharp narratives, and disciplined coalition-building - to the regulatory, political, and reputational objectives of its clients, whether they are industry challengers or longtime players pursuing their next phase of growth.
Fortius operates as a single, integrated advisory built around five core practice areas: Strategic Advisory, Policy, Regulatory & Geopolitical, Mergers & Acquisitions Campaigns & Coalitions, and Communications:
- Strategic Advisory: Fortius advises companies, executives, and investors on corporate strategy, helping clients anticipate challenges, identify opportunities, and develop strategies to achieve their business objectives. Capabilities include corporate strategy, CEO and board counsel, startup and VC advisory, data and analytics, AI-powered intelligence, and special situations.
- Policy, Regulatory, & Geopolitical Advisory: Fortius helps companies understand and navigate complex political, regulatory, and geopolitical environments, providing intelligence and counsel on changing regulations, market entry, geopolitical risks, policymakers, and other key stakeholders. Capabilities include regulatory strategy and market entry, geopolitical risk, political, legislative, and regulatory intelligence, policy and public affairs, research and vetting.
- Mergers & Acquisitions: Fortius advises companies on the political, regulatory, stakeholder, and communications dynamics that can determine the outcome of mergers, acquisitions, and other major transactions. Capabilities include investor and shareholder intelligence, strategic and political guidance, political and regulatory stakeholder mapping, transaction narrative and communications.
- Campaigns & Coalitions: Fortius designs and executes advocacy campaigns and coalitions that build support, mobilize stakeholders, and create the political will needed to drive change. Capabilities include campaign management, coalition building, grassroots mobilization, creator and influencer strategy, stakeholder mapping, opinion research and polling.
- Communications: Fortius provides strategic communications and reputation counsel to help companies and leaders shape their narratives, reach critical audiences, seize market opportunities, and respond to reputational challenges. Capabilities include strategic communications, political communications, financial communications, narrative development and messaging, media relations, creator and influencer strategy, creative, digital and media buying, reputation and threat monitoring, crisis preparedness and response.
In the UK, Fortius will compete across multiple sectors, including artificial intelligence (AI) and technology, energy and infrastructure, financial services, and fintech and life sciences.
As part of the rebrand, Fortius will formally spin out its political campaigns work into MCM². It will build, advise, and run those campaigns for candidates, parties, and causes - both in the UK and around the world.
MCM² draws from the last names of the four principals: Messina, Corrigan, Matsdorf, and Mallet. The move draws a clear line between Fortius’ corporate advisory business and its political practice, giving both teams their own identity.
“MCM² gives campaigns an edge,” said Ty Matsdorf, Partner at MCM². “Our political work has always been distinct from our corporate advisory business, and with its own name and leadership, we are in a stronger position to expand and grow.”
MCM²’s team has worked for more than 15 presidents and prime ministers across six continents, and continues to grow. What they learn in one country sharpens what they do in the next. Having a base in London puts MCM² on the ground for the candidates, parties, and campaigns they work with in the UK and around the world.
Jim Messina started The Messina Group in Washington, DC, in 2013 with three people in a borrowed, windowless office. Political analysts still consider the Obama campaign he ran as one of the best-run in modern American history.
In 2015, Jim advised David Cameron's Conservatives in the general election that returned the first Conservative majority government since 1992. The firm has since worked in 32 countries on six continents for Fortune 500 companies, founders and investors, and Presidents and Prime Ministers.
Fortius and MCM² carry that record forward with the same team and the same culture: fast, loyal, data-driven, and run by the people who actually do the work.