Havas reveals rebranding plans

Havas reveals rebranding plans

Havas

MUMBAI: Worldwide communications group Havas chief executive of advertising David Jones has revealed plans to rebrand the agencies under the company as it repositions for an increasingly digital future.

The group‘s new clients for online marketing include Unilever and Sony Playstation.

Jones said that the group will be retiring the 20-year-old Euro RSCG name for Havas’ largest creative network and bringing almost the whole group under the Havas brand.

Euro RSCG was formed in 1991 by the merger of two French agencies Eurocom and RSCG formed in the mid-1970s. The company structure will be consolidated into Havas Advertising and Havas Media. Jones was quoted in the Financial Times, "Within that we will launch Havas Digital as an umbrella brand for digital."

He further informed that he aimed to take on competitors like WPP and Publicis and create a model that contrasted their structures.

According to FT, Jones said, "The rebranding of Euro RSCG will reinforce the fact that our competitors have hundreds of brands and cultures and CEOs, and ours is an incredibly clear and simple structure. We haven’t got big, old-fashioned ad agencies that just do TV ads and have a separate digital silo."

Havas Digital will not have its own independent leadership or financial structure. The repositioning will underline Havas‘ more integrated model for providing services for example, by bringing formerly separate media-buying and creative teams into the same buildings in Paris and New York.

Meanwhile, Havas announced its financial results for the year ended 31 December 2011. The group has registered net income of 120 million euros, up 9 per cent from 110 million euros in 2010.

The revenue for the year was recorded at 1.65 billion euros, which is 5.6 per cent more than the revenue for fiscal 2010 at 1.56 billion euros.

The group informed in an official communiqué that its digital and social media grew rapidly and increased their contribution to the company’s overall revenue, as the group pursued its strategy of putting these businesses at the core of all its activities and agencies around the world. Digital and social media made up 23 per cent of the total group‘s revenue.

The geographical revenue break up reveals that Asia-Pacific reported growth of 9.8 per cent for full-year 2011.