RI has potential for global marketing services: Sorrel
RI has potential for global marketing services: Sorrel
JAKARTA (JP): Martin Sorrel, the chief executive officer of
WPP Group plc, a leading marketing services group, says that the
potential in Indonesia for various kinds of marketing services is
great.
"Besides its strong and persistent economic growth, Indonesia
and the Asia-Pacific region have a large population with a
growing middle class who has growing consumer tastes," Sorrel
told The Jakarta Post yesterday.
Indonesia and the region also offer opportunities for the
marketing services industries because their economy is driven by
export-strategies and free-trade policies, he said.
WPP plc is a London-based multinational with interests
spreading from various marketing and advertisement services to
plastic manufacturing.
Some of the group's famous subsidiaries include Ogilvy &
Mather Worldwide, J. Walter Thompson Company, Hill and Knowlton
and Research International.
WPP's turnover in 1993 reached around six billion British
pounds (around US$9.35 billion) while it recorded a net profit of
almost twenty-five million British pounds.
Sorrel also said that due to government regulations, WPP's
presence in Indonesia would take the form of an "affiliate-
business" which does not include equity involvement.
The group's affiliates in Indonesia include a J. Walter
Thompson tie-up with local ad agency Adforce, Ogilvy and Mather
with Indo-Ad (another local ad agency) and Research International
with PT Capricorn Mars Indotama.
"Of course we'd like the government, at some point in the
future, to allow us to make an equity investment so that we can
exercise some coordination control with our other ventures in the
region," Sorrel said.
He added that WPP would not insist on owning 100 percent of
their ventures here.
"In my opinion, the public relations and advertising business
in Indonesia are quite mature. We are confident in the country's
human resources development," he said.
The executive noted that WPP has had a "good history with the
Indonesian government" since one of its arms in the United
States, Hill and Knowlton, had, until last year, handled
Jakarta's public relations needs in Washington D.C. for 15 years.
The group's clients here included American Express, Unilever,
PT Freeport Indonesia and H.M. Sampoerna. (hdj)