And why should we inquire? Well, according to the new Campaign/Nielsen list of UK agency billings AMV/BBDO remains top dog (no surprise there) but, at £458m is more than one and a half times as big as number two McCann. ...
Read More »Michael Roth’s Interpublic finds itself back on the takeover menu – the a la carte version
Then there were three? There are four big marcoms holding companies (if you exclude Dentsu which is still 90 per cent Japan as it waits for clearance from China to buy Aegis): WPP, Omnicom, Publicis Groupe and interpublic (IPG). Late ...
Read More »WPP’s Sorrell and shareholders limber up for annual pay fist fight
This one is becoming a hardy perennial – according to the Sunday Times WPP investors are (once again) revolting over CEO Sir Martin Sorrell’s pay package. Last year SMS trousered about £13m in salary (£1.3m), bonus and shares (about £5.6m), ...
Read More »Was the great HSBC ad review just the bank’s way of putting a rocket under JWT and WPP?
So, what was all that about? HSBC’s group marketing director Chris Clark (left) calls a review of the “£400m” (actually rather less these days) global account late last year. Well, not exactly a review. More a series of private meetings ...
Read More »WPP in 2012 – solid but not spectacular
WPP more or less matched rivals Publicis Groupe and Havas, beat Interpublic but lagged Omnicom with growth of 2.9 per cent in 2012, according to its full year accounts released today. Billings fell slightly to around £44bn (blamed on the ...
Read More »Five key questions investors should ask WPP
WPP announces its 2012 results on Friday and the odds are that they’re going to be good – if the recent hike in its share price is anything to go by. WPP, because of its scale and the number of ...
Read More »Why UK out of home firm Outdoor Plus is remarkably well-connected
There’s a lot going on under the radar in OOH – or posters, as we anciently called it. And I’m not simply talking of Omnicom’s Eric Newnham-fronted effort to crash the charmed circle of UK specialist buyers – namely WPP-owned ...
Read More »$28bn Heinz buyout may land agencies in the soup
It’s always a nervous time for agencies when a big client changes hands and they don’t come much bigger than Heinz with its iconic brands, $12bn of global sales and $370m ad budget. The key to what happens next at ...
Read More »Chinese regulators threaten Aegis/Dentsu deal
Will Dentsu’s £3.2bn takeover of Aegis ever actually happen? Dentsu has been telling us for months that it’s only a matter of time – time needed to win regulatory approval in China, where Dentsu is desperate to expand and sees ...
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