Here’s another assault on the standard agency model. BETC’s new lab-agency offshoot, BETC Pop, is all about finding new ways to create content and events.

“Today, all content is in competition with all other types of content. Ads are in competition with film, music videos and everything else. What we want to do is create objects, events and experiences that will create meeting points between the different arts.” [Isabelle Tardieu, head of integrated projects, BETC Pop]

Havas’ BETC has launched an offshoot, BETC Pop.

The Pop in new BETC offshoot, BETC Pop stands for pop culture. BETC is giving standard agencies something new to think about by launching what it calls a lab-agency, which will live in BETC’s Paris office with 20 staff. BTC Pop will produce content and events across music, fashion, gastronomy, dance and brands, and will scout to unearth new musicians, producers, chefs and other collaborators to work on projects.

BETC Pop will be run by BETC’s vice president, Fabrice Brovelli and BETC Music’s managing director, Christophe Caurret. The new agency will replace BETC music. Isabelle Tardieu will managing integrated projects. Brovelli and Caurret will retain their existing roles. Brovelli has been head of BETC’s production department since 1998 and has worked with clients including Air France and Canal+. Caurret is BETC’s creative music director.

This is how they see their agency’s assets:

“POP: Because the frontiers between commerce and pop culture have become porous and content of every kind (ads, clips, movie trailers, video games, TV short formats, a dance performance, Internet memes or even the hottest new restaurant tips) is now competing for attention on a multiplicity of devices.

“SCOUTS: Because talent is central to the ultimate in content and experiences, BETC POP will channel all its passion and sincerity into scouting the talents of tomorrow, following on from We Are From LA, Justice, Woodkid, Romain Gavras, Flume, Disclosure, executive chef of La Jeune Rue Antonin Bonnet, designer Maud Bury and, shortly, Sundance award winner Kahlil Joseph or Glass Candy.

“LAB: Because BETC POP is a source of inspiration that shakes up the old advertising codes and draws together the worlds of entertainment – music, fashion, food, film, gaming, web culture – and design. All these ingredients are combined in an integrated agency centered around talents, a flat organization and different disciplines intersecting to write the future of pop culture.”

BETC Pop will initially work with existing BETC clients. BETC also has plans to launch the Pop agency in London, Los Angeles and Sao Paolo. It is launching with three projects on progress: La Jeune Rue gastro-district project, a project with France’s leading cinema operator, UGC, and another with international label, Air France Music.

Agency BETC is welcoming the birth of new pop culture lab-agency BETC POP.