Arcopol Chaudhuri

Mumbai: The Publicis Groupe is expanding its footprint for digital offerings in India and Singapore.

It has merged Digitas, the digital and interactive marketing agency it acquired for $1.3 billion in 2007, with Solutions, a marketing firm it acquired in 2006.

The merged entity will be called Solutions | Digitas.

Solutions Integrated Marketing services’ strength basically lies in direct marketing, digital initiatives, promotions and shopper marketing. Based in Delhi, it is led by founders Srikant Sastri and Kanika Mathur. While Sastri will be the managing director of Solutions | Digitas, Mathur will be its director and president.

Both will report to Alan Rutherford, CEO, Digitas Global.

Rutherford said the merger helps in catering to the increasing demand of digital solutions from clients from India and South-east Asia.

“Brand building is now happening digitally and marketing initiatives can do much more beyond the web. The merger essentially strengthens our expertise and business further in these regions.”

Some key global accounts of the Groupe in this region are Aviva, Pepsi, Philips,Microsoft, H-P, Gillette and Sony Ericsson.

Solutions|Digitas will continue to service Solutions’ existing clients as well as offering an Indian service for its global clients. It will also develop Prodigious, a digital production company that services the Groupe’s agencies and their clients.

Publicis agencies and various clients use Prodigious to create digital assets cheaply in India, China and Eastern Europe.With headquarters in New Delhi, it will operate in six cities in India (Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkata) as well as in Singapore.

The launch of Solutions | Digitas is a key move in strengthening Digitas’ presence in Asia, and part of its strategy to expand digital services into emerging markets and to grow digital market share across the globe.

The Groupe already has a well-established presence in India through its advertising networks Publicis, Leo Burnett, Saatchi and Saatchi, media networks Starcom Mediavest Group and Zenith Optimedia. The marketing services operations are, meanwhile, handled by Solutions and Hanmer and Partners MS&L.

Source : DNA