Swatch has determined to finish its two-decades lengthy relationship with GroupM in China and appoint Publicis as its media company of report (AOR), Marketing campaign can reveal.
First reported by Marketing campaign in February 2024, the Swiss watchmaker initiated a assessment of its media account reportedly price between $80 million to $100 million with Wavemaker, after a GroupM bribery scandal in China was revealed.
Different GroupM purchasers together with Dyson, Yum! Manufacturers, and Volvo had been additionally reported to have positioned their media accounts with the Group beneath assessment on the time, sending RFPs to varied companies, together with Publicis.
Marketing campaign understands Swatch despatched a request-for-proposal (RFP) to Publicis, OMG, Havas, and IPG, with solely Publicis confirming it was pitching for the account to Marketing campaign.
Wavemaker gained the Swatch account in 2018 from Kinetic Worldwide, who beforehand held it from 2015 to 2018, after GroupM sundown Kinetic’s operations in Asia-Pacific. Previous to this, the account was held by Mediacom (now EssenceMediacom) for a decade from 2005 to 2015.
In response to Comvergence, Wavemaker dealt with all offline media planning and shopping for for Swatch manufacturers together with Longines, Mido, Omega, Rado, Swatch and Tissot. OMD dealt with the digital media shopping for and programmatic for a similar Swatch manufacturers price $13 million in billings.
Swatch’s Harry Winston offline media shopping for and planning account, which is price $5 million in billings based on Comvergence, already sat with Publicis’ Starcom.
Marketing campaign understands that Publicis Media will now take over all of the above Wavemaker’s responsibilites. A number of sources inform Marketing campaign that like Publicis, OMD additionally pitched for the complete scope of labor however finally misplaced out.
Nevertheless, OMD will proceed to deal with digital media shopping for and programmatic for a similar Swatch manufacturers.
That is the second long-term GroupM shopper to depart for Publicis. In early April, Marketing campaign reported that Dyson additionally awarded its media account to Publicis Media in China, ending its 11-year relationship with GroupM.
When reached by Marketing campaign, Publicis and Swatch declined to remark, whereas GroupM and Wavemaker didn’t reply to queries.
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