Aegis acquires French agency, claims media dominance
By Erina Lin, Thursday 18 October 2007 at 22:29 :: Media Ownership :: #721 :: rss
Aegis, the UK-based agency holding company Thursday announced its acquisition of Implicom, a Paris-based firm specialising in sales promotion and direct marketing media. With about $4.6 million gross assets, Implicom will ally with Aegis Media unit, which oversees media networks like Carat, Isobar, Vizeum and Posterscope, and happens to be the dominant media buyer in France.
"Its expertise will help us further broaden our market-leading offer in France, where Aegis Media is the number one player," said Robert Lerwill, the group's CEO, according to Media Post. He said that Implicom would be part of an "integrated" offering.
The acquisition signals that, unlike some industry perceptions, Aegis is not a passive acquisition target, but is active in acquiring agency assets. And ironically, because Aegis was originally a French-rooted media buying shop, whose previous media buying practices ran against French business laws and thus was restructured as British-based Aegis Group.
In recent years, Aegis has been the target of possible takeovers from two French leading agency holding companies: Publicis and Havas. Publicis eventually passed on it, and acquired U.S. assets such as Digitas instead. But Vincent Bollore, Havas chairman, still remains the largest shareholder in Aegis Group and is still considered an “ardent suitor,” Media Post reported.




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