Xapads: From UK Market Entry to Global Expansion Partner

Xapads is a bootstrapped global ad-tech company, operating without external funding and focused on building sustainable international growth. As part of its expansion strategy, Xapads partnered with Urban Digital to establish senior commercial leadership for its UK and US market launches, creating credible, on-the-ground presence from scratch.

With no existing local teams and limited internal recruitment capacity, Xapads required experienced leaders who could quickly build commercial traction, represent the brand in new markets, and lay the foundations for long-term global scale.

The Challenge:

As Xapads entered new international markets, it faced several complex hiring challenges:

• Launching into the highly competitive UK ad-tech market with no existing local presence

• Requirement for a senior, market-leading hire to establish credibility and drive early revenue

• Limited internal bandwidth to manage high-stakes, senior market-entry recruitment

• Need for candidates with deep ad-tech expertise and international commercial experience

• Increased urgency and complexity as expansion extended beyond the UK into the US and Germany

Our Approach:

Urban Digital acted as a strategic partner, delivering a tailored market-entry hiring strategy:

• Conducted deep market research and competitor mapping to identify top senior talent in each region

• Executed targeted headhunting of senior, passive candidates with proven ad-tech and international growth experience

• Delivered pre-screened, high-quality shortlists aligned to culture, capability, and market-entry objectives

• Managed full interview coordination and offer negotiation, ensuring speed and stakeholder alignment

• Replicated and refined the approach to support subsequent US and German market launches

Our Results:

The partnership delivered immediate and long-term commercial impact:

• 3 senior hires successfully placed, including:

  • Country Head – UK

  • Country Head – US West Coast

  • Country Head – LATAM

• Established UK market presence from zero, with credible senior leadership in place

• Secured leaders capable of driving early commercial traction and brand representation

• Created a scalable hiring blueprint for future international expansion

Following the success of the initial engagements, Xapads has since re-engaged Urban Digital to support additional market-entry hires across Germany and other regions.