BOSTON, MA – September 8, 2026 – Aquent, the leading global creative staffing agency, today announced the launch of Milton, its AI portfolio search engine that enables recruiters to source talent who match their clients’ creative vision.
Milton is powered by proprietary AI visual search, not keywords. This means it can see and interpret what is actually in each portfolio piece, understanding the meaning and concept behind a piece of creative work. Recruiters can search using reference images or descriptive text, and Milton provides matches based on meaning and semantic understanding. Milton brings creative work together in one searchable place, currently with a database of more than 10 million portfolio pieces sourced from talent websites, with additional portfolio sources on the way.
« For decades, creative hiring has relied on keyword searches that simply cannot see what is actually in a talent’s portfolio, » said John H. Chuang, founder and CEO of Aquent. « With Milton, we are solving a major friction point for our clients by bringing disparate creative work into one place and matching what our clients are looking for visually, faster and with more accuracy. At the same time, we keep human expertise at the heart of staffing. Milton helps our recruiters collaborate more effectively with clients and talent, so technology enhances the human connection rather than replacing it. »
Aquent recruiters leverage Milton as part of their hands-on recruiting process. A recruiter partners with a client to create a visual-based search query using images or text that capture what they are looking for creatively. Milton runs that query across its portfolio database to surface the closest visual matches. The recruiter then evaluates potential matches on project experience, soft skills, rate, and availability, and builds the candidate shortlist.
Aquent is also developing personalized talent pools on top of Milton. Recruiters will be able to define search criteria for a client’s future talent needs, and Milton will continuously search the more than 9,000 new portfolios added each month to surface fresh matches, giving clients an always-on pool of vetted talent ready when they need to hire.
To learn more about Milton or connect with an Aquent recruiter, visit aquent.com/milton.
