Persimmon management to bag £600m bonus June 13, 2016 Persimmon's executive pay plan has come under fire after it emerged management will share £600m over the next five years. A top City investor has urged the housebuilder to reduce the payment, which represents one of the biggest at a FTSE 100 company, excluding banking. Read more: There's little logic to 2016's shareholder revolts against executive pay [...]
The next internet: AppNexus CEO Brian O’Kelley lays out his vision for the programmable age June 13, 2016 At six foot five, there isn’t much which can dwarf Brian O’Kelley. His adtech company AppNexus, which allows marketers and publishers to buy and sell advertising space in real-time, has grown exponentially since its founding in 2007. Today, the firm’s ad-serving infrastructure processes 5m requests per second at peak periods, facilitating an estimated $2bn of transactions [...]
Sir Martin Sorrell given bloody nose over pay – but majority of shareholders still ok with £70m deal June 8, 2016 WPP shareholders today told chief executive Sir Martin Sorrell that they were less than impressed with his £70m pay package, with 33.45 per cent choosing to vote against it. Although the majority of investors still chose to wave through boardroom pay at the advertising giant, the proportion voting against is still up on last year, when some 20 [...]
Brexit would not affect UK advertising industry spending… not immediately, anyway June 8, 2016 A UK vote to leave the European Union would have no immediate effect on advertising industry spending, new research suggests. But media agency Zenith has claimed that a Brexit could cost the UK £70m in adspend growth a year, totalling around £1bn by 2030. This figure is based on controversial Treasury research claiming that the UK’s [...]
How UK media companies are surviving digital disruption June 7, 2016 The UK’s media and entertainment sector is in “rude health”, with revenues up 21 per cent since 2011, despite digital disruption. Deloitte’s Media Metrics 2016 report looked at the 100 largest UK companies in the area, finding a total turnover of £87bn in the firms’ latest accounts. Deloitte predicts this number, based on 2014 or [...]
More pressure on Martin Sorrell over £70.4m pay package ahead of WPP’s AGM June 7, 2016 A public sector pension investment body has urged the 70 funds it advises to reject Sir Martin Sorrell’s £70.4m pay package at WPP’s AGM tomorrow. The Local Authority Pension Fund Forum (LAPFF) joins shareholder advisory firms Pirc and ShareSoc in recommending the package be voted against. Kieran Quinn, chairman of LAPFF, said: “Most shareholders will, [...]
Revolts are not just for shareholders: Why the public should demand more from UK Plc June 6, 2016 From BP chief executive Bob Dudley’s bloody nose over his £14m pay deal to Weir Group’s remuneration committee being forced back to the drawing board to rethink their executive payment policies, investors have made it clear this AGM season that they’re no longer prepared to put up with outlandish boardroom pay. More spirited revolts could [...]
Investors are lining up to vote against Martin Sorrell’s pay package June 5, 2016 Investors are set to revolt this week over Sir Martin Sorrell's £70m pay packet – up from £44m last year. More institutional investors are lining up to oppose the WPP chief executive's remuneration than last year, when 22 per cent rejected the company's remuneration report, according to the Sunday Telegraph. This year, the AGM takes place on [...]
Reject Sorrell’s £70m pay, Pirc tells WPP shareholders June 1, 2016 An influential shareholder group has called on investors to reject the £70m pay packet of WPP chief executive Sir Martin Sorrell. Shareholders have been advised to oppose the pay of the highest paid boss of any FTSE firm, which was dubbed "excessive", by the investor advisory body Pirc. WPP, which owns advertising agency JWT and Ogilvy & Mather, is due [...]
London ad agency VCCP expands into the US with acquisition May 23, 2016 London advertising agency VCCP has expanded into the US, with the purchase of a San Francisco based firm. VCCP is owned by Chime Communications, which was bought for £347m last year by Sir Martin Sorrell's WPP and Providence Equity Partners. It has purchased MUH-TAY-ZIK | HOF-FER, an ad agency which counts Audi and Netflix among its [...]