Much has been made over the past few years of the threat posed to traditional ad and marcomms agencies by the management consultancies. This was especially true when Karmarama, one of the last remaining London indies of any scale, was snapped up not by a WPP or Omnicom, as one might expect, but by consulting […]
Mark Read promised “decisive action” to revive WPP and his latest intervention – merging 154-year-old ad agency JWT with digital goliath Wunderman – does not disappoint. Not only does it call time on the world’s oldest-standing agency brand, but it signals how advertising agencies, no matter how renowned, will not be the driving force behind […]
You can’t keep Sir Martin Sorrell down, or out of the news. Shares in Sir Martin’s new venture, S4 Capital Group, were last week re-admitted to the London Stock Exchange’s Main Market. The relisting of the shares follows Sorrell’s taking the helm at Derriston Capital back in May (shares were suspended immediately), its reverse merger […]
WPP has named Mark Read as its chief executive after a period as joint chief operating officer, succeeding Sir Martin Sorrell who departed in April. Read, who held the post of global chief executive of Wunderman until stepping up alongside Andrew Scott to helm the company while a successor was sought, has long been the […]
Run your agency as if you are about to sell it tomorrow. Tony shares key insights about the importance of setting objectives for growth that in turn, guide the new business & marketing plan and activities. Listen to the audio podcast here
The headlines over the past few months have been so dominated by WPP and Publicis that it’s almost easy to forget that other holding groups exist. Not least Omnicom, which has managed to stay under the radar for the past year or so. But this week industry-watchers were reminded that Omnicom does still exist – […]
Sir Martin Sorrell’s former employer, WPP, is understood to be trying to beat him to the race to acquire MediaMonks. Earlier today the Dutch digital production firm emerged as the first takeover target for Sorrell’s new S4 Capital venture, which he joined after leaving his WPP chief executive post in acrimonious fashion in April. But […]
As expected, Sir Martin Sorrell will return to the industry, although perhaps most people didn’t expect him to do so quite so quickly, less than two months after exiting his post at his beloved WPP. His return as executive chairman of S4 Capital, which has just completed £51m of equity funding (most of which has […]
Despite his eye-watering salary, an ugly past business year and personal misconduct allegations still left unresolved, the industry’s response to Sir Martin Sorrell’s WPP resignation smacks more of effusive obituary than critical analysis. But alongside the tributes is a feeling of invigoration: a hopeful sense that things will never be the same again without the […]
WPP may have spent recent months promising to transform the agency model but it is the world’s biggest advertiser – rather than the world’s biggest advertising supplier – that has launched the most significant new agency of 2018 so far. Procter & Gamble revealed this week that it is setting up a dedicated agency to […]