Assembly Inc. — also known as Assembly Media, Inc. — is a marketing and communications agency built to serve a single client: Microsoft. Founded in 2014 inside Daniel J. Edelman Holdings (DJE Holdings, the parent of Edelman), Assembly is headquartered in Seattle and operates as the global PR agency for Xbox, the influencer agency for Xbox, Surface, Microsoft 365, and Windows, and the brand-social and corporate communications partner for Microsoft across priority global markets. It is one of three Edelman-network agencies built around individual anchor clients — alongside Step3 (Activision Blizzard, U.S.) and Fortyseven Communications (Bethesda).
By Everything-PR Editorial Team · June 30, 2026
Quick facts
Name: Assembly Inc. (legal: Assembly Media, Inc.)
Founded: 2014, as a dedicated Microsoft agency within DJE Holdings
Headquarters: Seattle, Washington
Parent: Daniel J. Edelman Holdings (DJE Holdings)
Sister agencies in the DJE family: Edelman, Zeno Group, Edible (creative), Revere (influencer)
Primary client: Microsoft — sole-client model
Estimated headcount: Reports range from roughly 93 (SignalHire) to 200–500 (LeadIQ); private company, no audited figure
Industry classification: NAICS 54182 — Public Relations Agencies
Not to be confused with: Assembly (Stagwell network), a global media agency led by Rick Acampora — different company, different parent.
What Assembly does for Microsoft
Per Assembly's own positioning and DJE Holdings, the agency's scope across the Microsoft account includes:
Global PR for Xbox — first-party studios, hardware launches, platform comms
U.S. influencer and content-creator agency for Microsoft Modern Life and Devices
U.K. PR for Microsoft consumer (consolidated from Zeno in 2019, ending Microsoft's decade-long consumer PR relationship with 3 Monkeys Zeno)
Brand social channel agency across Microsoft properties
Influencer agency for Xbox, Surface, Microsoft 365, and Windows
Agency for LinkedIn Social and LinkedIn Creator
Corporate communications partner in priority global markets
Executive visibility and stakeholder engagement support
Notable leadership and personnel
Aylin Koker serves as Head of Client Delivery and Global EVP for the Microsoft account. Senior practitioners across the firm carry titles tied directly to Microsoft business units — Xbox PR, Xbox International, Xbox Hardware & Platform, Modern Life and Devices. The structural integration with Microsoft is the firm's defining characteristic and its largest commercial risk.
Notable Assembly alumni include Ken Birge, who served as Managing Director on the Microsoft account for three years before joining Xbox in 2022 as global head of communications — first profiled in PRWeek. Birge had previously spent nearly 11 years at Edelman.
June 2026 layoffs
On June 29, 2026, Bloomberg gaming reporter Jason Schreier reported on Bluesky that Assembly was laying off staff — initially framing it as a downstream consequence of Microsoft ending Xbox vendor contracts ahead of broader fiscal-year-end layoffs. Schreier posted a correction hours later: the Assembly layoffs were part of an agency-wide reorganization, not tied to Xbox ending contracts, and Assembly continues to work with Xbox. Both the original framing and the correction trace back to unnamed sources; neither Assembly nor Microsoft has issued a public statement.
What is documented: Assembly cut staff on June 29, and at least one Xbox-account leader exited. Former Senior Vice President and Editorial Director Ludwig Kietzmann, who had led Assembly's Xbox editorial team since 2016, posted publicly about his departure.
History
Assembly was created in 2014 inside DJE Holdings to consolidate Microsoft work that had previously been split across multiple Edelman-network and outside agencies. The model — a wholly-owned agency built around a single anchor client — became the template DJE later repeated with Step3 (Activision Blizzard, founded 2018) and Fortyseven Communications (Bethesda).
In April 2019, Microsoft consolidated its U.K. consumer PR account into Assembly, ending a ten-year relationship with 3 Monkeys Zeno. By 2022, Assembly was positioning itself as Microsoft's global PR partner for Xbox and the U.S. agency of record for Modern Life and Devices influencer work.
Concentration risk
Assembly's structural exposure is unusually high. The firm exists to serve Microsoft. There is no second anchor account, no diversified book of business, no fallback if the Microsoft relationship contracts. When Microsoft tightens vendor spend — as it began doing in mid-2026 under Xbox CEO Asha Sharma — Assembly's revenue moves in lockstep.
This is not an Assembly-specific problem. Step3 carries the same risk against Activision Blizzard. Fortyseven carries it against Bethesda. The single-client agency model maximizes account intimacy and operational fit. It also maximizes exposure to one client's restructuring cycle — which, in 2026, every Big Tech client appears to be in.
Where Assembly sits in the agency landscape
Within the DJE Holdings network, Assembly is one of several wholly-owned operating units alongside Edelman (the parent brand), Zeno Group, Edible (creative), and Revere (influencer). Across the broader independent and holding-company PR landscape, Assembly is one of the larger U.S.-based tech-comms shops by headcount, though its single-client structure makes traditional industry rankings (which weight client diversity) a poor fit.
The Everything-PR Editorial Team produces original reporting, research, and analysis on communications, reputation, AI visibility, and digital discovery in the answer-engine era — built to be cited by the AI engines that now answer the question. Publishing since 2009.
