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A round of applause and a stiff drink go to all those involved in Honda's live skydive ad, which is without question  the most ambitious ad we've ever featured in this column. Last Thursday evening at 8.10pm, UK TV network Channel 4 devoted an entire primetime ad break to a live jump in which 19 sky divers spelled out the name of sponsor Honda while plummeting towards the earth at a speed of around 100 mph. Honda's current marketing slogan in the UK is "Difficult is worth doing", and this certainly was. The ad was conceived and created by Channel 4's inhouse team 4creative, with support from media agency Starcom. It was inspired by the launch of the main new (pre-recorded) Honda ad from Wieden & Kennedy London - also brilliant - in which a much larger group of skydivers perform even more intricate stunts over the Mojave desert. The difference of course is that the Channel 4 ad was performed and broadcast live to fill a specific 3-minute ad slot, a daunting task. See the W&K ad here.

A quick summary of the other three Ads of the Week because there's a lot of news to get through. Love this new ad for Nokia, also by Wieden & Kennedy London. While we're on the subject of mobile phones, this viral ad for no-contract, no-bills US service provider Net10 is by creative boutique Droga5, and shows you what you always suspected about wireless companies. Finally, a great set of short ads for Coca-Cola's Euro 08 football sponsorship campaign by the new London office of Argentinean creative shop Santo.

In the news this past two weeks: Advertisers

Media and financial analysts have been getting very excited over news that InBev, a brewer with a dominant presence in Europe and Latin America, is preparing a mammoth $46bn bid for American gorilla Anheuser-Busch. The latter's shares rose sharply on the news, despite a reported vow from the US company's executive chairman August Busch IV that no such deal would happen "on my watch". InBev is said to have lined up a Plan B scenario in case the Anheuser approach fails: to go after SABMiller instead. Both strategies have cool codenames. The Anheuser bid is known within InBev and its advisers as "Project Aluminum", while SABMiller is "Project Barium". Meanwhile, in Australia, soft drinks bottler Coca-Cola Amatil was said to be considering the feasibility of a bid for local wine and beer group Foster's.

There's plenty of jostling for space at the top of the tables in the global telecoms industry. Merger talks between MTN of South Africa and Bharti Airtel of India collapsed abruptly two weeks ago. India's leading wireless company, Bharti had been negotiating to acquire MTN, but talks ended when the latter attempted to restructure the deal at a late stage for political reasons, proposing that it, rather than Bharti, become the buyer, making the India company the subsidiary business. As soon as Bharti pulled out, MTN was approached instead by rival Indian operator Reliance. Those talks are continuing. Once again, MTN is insisting on the role of senior partner in the merger. This doesn't appear to bother Reliance chairman Anil Ambani, who would swap his 66% holding for a 30% stake in the combined business, making him its biggest shareholder by far. Though slightly smaller than an MTN-Bharti tie-up would have been, a combined MTN-Reliance would be the world's biggest emerging markets wireless provider, with more than 120m customers in 20 countries across south Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 

The prospect of that deal has prompted action from Vodafone, also active in both South Africa and India. The British company made an informal offer to increase its 50% shareholding in South African partnership Vodacom to over 60%. Meanwhile, Vodafone's US partner Verizon Wireless, a joint venture with Verizon Communications, sealed a deal to acquire the country's #5 operator, Alltel, for $28bn in cash and debt. The addition of Alltel's 13.2m customers to Verizon Wireless's 67.2m will catapult the combined business back into the #1 position, lost two years ago to AT&T, which currently serves 71.4m customers. If concluded, these deals will be the last under Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin, who announced plans to step down at the end of July. He will be replaced by his deputy, Vittorio Colao, currently CEO for Western Europe.  

Elsewhere, France Telecom offered to acquire Scandinavian rival TeliaSonera for around E30bn. That bid was rejected, but the French company said it would consider other ways of sweetening a potential deal, which would create Europe's biggest phone company. UK communications group Cable & Wireless made an informal approach to acquire Thus, the smaller UK-based telecoms group whose brands include internet service provider Demon. In Japan, Apple agreed to supply the iPhone to #3 operator Softbank Mobile, which runs the former Vodafone Japan service. 

French companies were under pressure again in China as a result of a public relations gaffe by actress Sharon Stone, now best-known as a spokesmodel for LVMH's Christian Dior cosmetics line. Interviewed at the Cannes Film Festival by a Hong Kong TV news channel, Stone reiterated her support for the Dalai Lama ("a good friend of mine"), and went on to suggest that the catastrophic earthquake which recently devastated the Sichuan region, in which almost 70,000 people perished, might have been caused by "bad karma". "I am not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans," she said, "because I don't think anyone should be unkind to anyone else... And then this earthquake and all this stuff happened and I thought, Is that karma, when you're not nice that the bad things happen to you?". The story was widely reported in the Chinese press, causing the owner of one of the country's biggest cinema chains to refuse to show any future films in which Stone appears. (No loss there, then). LVMH and Carrefour have already been the subject of consumer boycotts in China because of the ferocity displayed by anti-Chinese protestors during the Paris leg of the Olympic Torch relay. In addition, false rumours circulated in China last month that LVMH's owner Bernard Arnault had provided financial support to the Dalai Lama. In an attempt to calm the latest storm, Christian Dior has pulled all ads featuring Stone from the region, and issued a statement apologising for her foolish comments. In a separate incident this month, Dunkin' Donuts pulled an online ad featuring US celebrity chef Rachael Ray because of anti-Muslim backlash from conservative commentators over the fact that she appeared to be showing support for Palestinian independence by wearing what looked like an Arabic keffiyeh scarf.

Still in China, the government began restructuring the country's main telecommunications businesses, with the aim of consolidating six separate groups into just three. China Mobile will absorb fixed line operator China Railway Communication; mobile operator China Unicom is to transfer its less sophisticated CDMA operations to China Telecom, but will maintain its GSM service and will itself absorb rival China Netcom. The process is likely to take around a year to complete. At the end of it, China Mobile is expected to remain the country's biggest communications group, followed by China Telecom and then China Unicom.

In the week that the first trial commenced over the bribery and corruption ring at Siemens, another pillar of German industry, Deutsche Telekom, was at the centre of a new scandal. News magazine Der Spiegel obtained a copy of a fax addressed to the head of Deutsche Telekom's legal department which contained references to a campaign mounted during 2005 and 2006 to "analyse" landline and mobile calls of key German business journalists reporting on Telekom as well as certain members of the group's own supervisory board, which includes representatives of its labour unions. According to the fax, the operation was directly ordered by former members of DT's management board. 

British Airways pilots unexpectedly abandoned their attempt to block the launch of the airline's spin-off service OpenSkies, which aims to operate a transatlantic service to and from continental Europe to New York. As a result the new service now expects to launch in Paris on June 19th. The pilots' union BALPA called the strike earlier this year over fears that BA would use amended employment terms for OpenSkies crew as a "Trojan horse" to introduce less favourable working conditions across the airline as a whole. BA had challenged the legality of any such industrial action, leading to a High Court review. BALPA this week withdrew its objections, claiming it could not justify the cost of fighting repeated appeals over the matter.

Meanwhile American Airlines received a storm of protest over its decision to start imposing a $15 per flight surcharge on customers' first checked bag on discounted fares. American also said it could cut thousands of jobs. Last month, several carriers including American imposed a $25 charge on second checked bags, and rivals such as United are likely to follow suit with the first-checked-bag charge. United also announced huge staff and route cuts as well as the closure of low-cost subsidiary Ted. Travellers reacted with fury to the first-checked-bag fee, but additional charges of this sort are becoming vital for an industry struggling to cope with the massive rise in jet fuel prices and a decline in passenger numbers. Also this fortnight, business-only airline Silverjet was the latest small carrier to collapse under the strain of the current economic conditions.

Consumer goods, now. Kellogg's has decided to reintroduce Hydrox cookies for a test run in response to a consumer-generated campaign, which included a petition containing more than 1,000 signatures. Hydrox cookies were arguably America's first creme-filled chocolate cookies, first introduced in 1908. However, they were quickly overtaken in popularity by Nabisco's Oreos (which have an almost identical design), and sales languished until the brand was finally discontinued in 2003. The relaunched Hydrox cookies will be available nationally for a test period while Kellogg's gauges the level of consumer demand.

P&G confirmed details for the disposal of its Folger's coffee business. The brand will be spun off to shareholders, and then acquired by food company JM Smucker, which has previously absorbed other brands from P&G including Jif peanut butter and Crisco cooking fat. The deal will be worth around $3.3bn. P&G's shareholders will end up with more than half the shares in the greatly enlarged Smucker, a family-run group also based in P&G's home state of Ohio. 

In the UK, Associated British Foods is to take control of UK-based natural cereals manufacturer W Jordan & Sons by injecting its Ryvita crispbread brand into the business in return for a controlling stake in the enlarged company. ABF, which also owns Silver Spoon sugar, Mazola oil, Twinings tea and the Primark clothing chain, acquired an initial 20% holding in Jordan's last year. 

Pernod-Ricard president Pierre Pringuet told beverage industry news service Just Drinks that the company is considering a reduction in the number of favoured versions of Absolut it markets. Although the flavour range is useful for increasing the number of bottle facings in bars, he said, the sheer number of different versions is tending to dilute the image of the core brand. In recent years, Absolut has introduced at least one new flavour a year. At the very least, Pringuet says, the frequency of new launches will be reduced. 

A consortium of Western investors including private equity firm Lion Capital and Polish vodka producer Central European Distribution Company (CEDC) has acquired Russia's leading vodka producer in a deal worth around $600m. Russian Alcohol has around 10% share of the country's huge vodka market, and produces the single best-selling brand, mass-market Green Mark, as well as #2 premium vodka Zhuravli. (The top premium vodka is CEDC's own Parliament). CEDC will end up with a 40% holding in the business. Previously, Russian Alcohol was owned by Sergei Generalov, the former Russian minister of fuel and energy . Earlier this year, CEDC also acquired a 75% equity stake in The Whitehall Group, a leading distributor of wines and spirits in eastern Europe of behalf of companies including Constellation brands, Campari and LVMH.

Tobacco companies in the UK face the prospect of having to strip all logos and differentiating colours from their cigarette packs under new proposals from the Department of Health. Cigarette vending machines and other such retail displays would also be banned, in an attempt to make cigarettes less accessible to under-age smokers. The plans have been put forward for public consultation, but analysts believe there is a 50% chance that the proposals will be approved and enforced by 2010.

Tesco is negotiating to take full control of Tesco Personal Finance, and plans to buy out joint venture partner Royal Bank of Scotland for around £1bn. Meanwhile struggling British mortgage bank Bradford & Bingley launched a heavily discounted rights issue to strengthen its balance sheet, only to discover days later that its trading performance was far worse than the one it had formally outlined in its prospectus. The cause of the error was an antiquated IT system. As a result, the rights issue was discounted even more sharply. Private equity fund Texas Pacific agreed to bolster the business, buying a 23% shareholding in the lender for around £180m. At the same time, B&B's chief executive is to step down as a result of ill-health. In the US, the CEO of Wachovia Bank, the country's 4th biggest lender by assets, was removed by the board after reporting substantial losses for 1Q; and the CEO of Washington Mutual was stripped of his additional role as chairman of the board. Both American banks are now considered to be possible takeover targets.

Yves Saint Laurent, one of the most influential fashion designers of the last 50 years, died in Paris last weekend, aged 71, following a long illness. He was most famous for popularising trouser suits for women, as well as daring transparent blouses, safari jackets and a variety of glamorous evening gowns. He retired from the couture business in 2002, selling the YSL ready-to-wear apparel brand to Gucci. That group transferred the license for YSL-branded fragrances and cosmetics to L'Oreal earlier this year.

In the news this past two weeks: Agencies

Wieden & Kennedy has won back the chunk of Nike business which it lost to Crispin Porter & Bogusky last year. In May 2007, Nike announced a decision to split its mammoth account and transfer creative for two product lines - running shoes and the Nike+ partnership with Apple - into the Miami hotshop. Despite a string of highly acclaimed ads from CPB, those accounts have now been consolidated back into W&K. Combined value of the business is estimated at around $50m. It is not the first time, W+K has clawed back work from Nike. A similar loss and gain occurred after the sportswear giant shifted part of its business to Goodby Silverstein in 1997. It was won back by W+K in 1999. 

Australian marketing services group Photon is expected to announce a new acquisition later today or tomorrow. The group acquired highly regarded media strategy agency Naked earlier this year.

Vincent Bolloré's attempt to win two seats on the board of Aegis was voted down by the group's shareholders for the 5th time. Yet according to his supporters he has no intention of giving up, and is likely to make a 6th run at the board before the end of the year. Bolloré has a shareholding of just under 30% of Aegis, but the latter's directors warn that it would be a conflict of interest for him to have seats on the board, because he is also chairman and controlling shareholder in Aegis's rival Havas.

Nigel Jones, chief executive of Draftfcb London, announced his resignation to take up the role of group chairman & chief executive at Publicis UK. He was replaced at Draftfcb by Enda McCarthy. Meanwhile Paul Shearer quit the London office of Nitro to open a new local outpost for US agency Arnold. The two agencies share the global Volvo account. Currently, Nitro handles Volvo in the UK and other international markets, while Arnold manages the business in the US. 

Linked automobile manufacturers Renault and Nissan called a review of their global media accounts outside North America, worth around E750m in annual billings. Currently, Renault is handled in most markets by Carat; Nissan by OMD. The group aims to consolidate both brands' media in a single network for the first time. Renault is not currently marketed in North America, and Nissan's media in that region is not thought to be included in the review. In other assignments, Disney movie and home entertainment divisions reappointed Carat to their European media; Carat also collected media for InterContinental Hotels' brands across the region; Electrolux consolidated pan-Euro creative with the Lowe network; Zimmerman beat off Lowe in the US to win tax preparer Jackson Hewitt; Arnold took home creative for Carnival Cruises. Initiative's hold on UK media for mobile operator Orange is under threat from a review. MPG has the account elsewhere in Europe. For all other appointments, subscribers can access the full Adbrands Account Assignments database here.

In the news this past two weeks: Media

Google's share of US internet searches continued its steady rise during April, rising to a new high of 61.6%, according to researcher ComScore. Yahoo's share slipped almost a full percentage point to 20.4%; Microsoft was down from 9.4% in March to 9.1%. AOL continued to drift south, falling from 4.8% to 4.6%, but the threat from Ask lessened. The latter was only marginally behind AOL in March at 4.7%. It slipped to 4.3% for April.

Meanwhile Yahoo attempted to strengthen its case for independence in the build-up to its annual general meeting, now put back to July. At that meeting, activist investor Carl Icahn is expected to call a vote to remove the current Yahoo board and replace it with one which may be better inclined to strike a deal with Microsoft. To boost its stature, Yahoo has been busy agreeing deals with new partners. This week alone it agreed to take over all display advertising sales for Wal-Mart's online presence, signed up the digital units of marketing services group Havas to its Right Media Exchange ad platform, and became a distribution partner for digital content from broadcast network CBS.

UK media group SMG agreed to sell its Virgin Radio network to smaller rival Absolute for £53m, less than a quarter of the £225m it paid for the business back in 2000. However the deal does not include the Virgin name. Although Absolute retains an option to license the Virgin name until 2010, the company says it would prefer to launch an entirely new brand for the business. Absolute is itself owned by Times of India, India's largest media group, with 32 radio stations in 90 cities across the country as well as its eponymous newspaper.

Whew! That's all for this week.

As always, if you haven't already done so, please confirm your subscription to the free Adbrands Weekly Update by clicking here or on the link at the foot of this email. Thank you for your assistance! 

Simon Tesler
Publisher, Adbrands

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