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Our favourite ads this week: 

Unilever's Axe / Lynx male grooming range seems to inspire superlative work from all the agencies who work on the account. The Australian campaign from Lowe Hunt, a mix of traditional advertising and below-the-line marketing, has been excellent, collecting numerous awards during the course of the year, most recently Grand Prix at the Australian Direct Marketing Awards. Sadly the accompanying website has now shuttered, but the TV ad for imaginary airline LynxJet is still available online. "Imagine... a level of comfort never experienced before in air travel...".  

Although there are no visible references to client Microsoft, web portal Ms Dewey is a clever front-end for the software giant's new Windows Live Search service. The portal was created by design shop Evolution Bureau. Type in a question and sexy, sassy Ms Dewey (actually actress Janina Gavankar) fires back a pre-programmed, witty but appropriate response before presenting a list of search results. (Try asking for her phone number). It's reminiscent of other user-input sites such as Burger King's Subservient Chicken, but much more nicer to look at! 

Finally, I would never have expected to include an ad for Marks & Spencer among the ads of the week, but the store's Christmas special, From M&S With Love, is a surprisingly elegant 007 pastiche, tying in neatly with the release of Casino Royale. RKCR/Y&R is responsible for this increasingly effective series.

In the news this week: Advertisers

UK cable giant NTL, which last week announced that it will change its name to Virgin Media early in 2007, is still hungry for deals. Not content with the purchase of Telewest and Virgin Mobile in 2006, it has now set its eyes on the country's struggling commercial broadcaster ITV. It's a high risk strategy, but that's familiar turf for Richard Branson, who would become the biggest shareholder in a merged NTL-ITV. Branson has spent his whole career betting on all-or-nothing gambles. This one could well be the biggest. NTL already has almost £6m of debt, and would have to raise as much as another £5bn-£6bn in cash to buy ITV. Yet the company is still in the process of digesting its last two purchases. Despite Branson's eagerness, other NTL shareholders have voiced their concerns over such a mammoth new deal, and media agency bosses vowed to boycott any proposed merger of ITV and NTL's respective sales operations. The cable company's strongest card could be Michael Jackson, the former Channel 4 executive whom it wants to install as head of a merged company. Several industry figures, including WPP boss Martin Sorrell, have endorsed Jackson, currently working in the US for Barry Diller's IAC, as the ideal candidate to rescue ITV, whether or not as part of a deal with NTL.

Caught in the void between shareholders demanding higher profits and labour leaders protesting job cuts, Deutsche Telekom chief Kai-Uwe Ricke was forced to resign at the end of last week by the German government. T-Mobile boss Rene Obermann is expected to replace him as group CEO. Meanwhile, the turmoil at Volkswagen continues. Following the appointment of Audi boss Martin Winterkorn as the new group CEO, replacing Bernd Pischetsrieder, VW brand chairman Wolfgang Bernhard has also tendered his resignation. Winterkorn is expected to unveil a restructuring of the group in the new year, including a realignment of its various marques into different divisions. Meanwhile, Porsche, the privately owned carmaker controlled by the family of VW chairman Ferdinand Piech, continued its steady accumulation of shares. It expressed its intention to increase its holding to just under 30%, and had built a stake of 27% by mid-week.

Time Warner named Randy Falco as the new chairman & CEO of online business AOL, replacing Jonathan Miller. Falco was previously the #2 executive at NBC. His task will be to manage AOL's transformation from a subscription business to a free service funded entirely by advertising.

Virtual online world Second Life is rapidly gaining popularity within the marketing community. The latest advertiser to establish a presence there is Dell, which this week opened a virtual factory where players can buy computers and visit a Dell museum, including a replica of the college dormitory room where Michael Dell started the business. Several other marketers are already present within Second Life, including Toyota and Starwood Hotels, and ad agency Leo Burnett. (For readers who have yet to explore it, Second Life is a 3D world similar in style to The Sims game, where thousands of players can interact virtually with one another in real time through avatars. Explore it here.)

US Airways, one of America's smaller national carriers, has offered to acquire the much larger Delta Airlines for around $8bn when the latter emerges from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Delta's management would prefer to remain independent, but may be forced into the merger by its creditors. A combined business would be the world's biggest airline.

US mobile operator Cingular promised to begin offering mobile banking via handsets early next year. However the company has yet to say which (if any) banks have signed up for the service. Meanwhile, a joint venture between Spanish phone group Telefonica and its Asian strategic partner China Netcom is to become the largest shareholder in Hong Kong-based fixed line operator PCCW. In Europe, Vodafone warned that smaller operators in the mobile sector were likely to be squeezed out of the market in the next year or two, and took the opportunity to express its willingness to acquire the UK and Italian operations of Hutchison's 3 if they were put up for sale.

In the news this week: Agencies

Ogilvy & Mather has split its two brand names in the UK to form separate units. The main Ogilvy & Mather agency will now be known as Ogilvy Advertising, while Mather Communications is a new unit, which will specialise in conflict clients. It will launch in February with three as yet unnamed clients. Steve Lepley, current COO of Ogilvy & Mather London, is the founding managing director of Mather. 

Campaign reported that hot UK shop Clemmow Hornby Inge is in talks to sell a 49% shareholding to Havas. Marketing services group Media Square this week added a new Chinese outpost to its Gate Worldwide network, with the acquisition of Shanghai's Cremo Advertising, and also sold sponsorship agency Karen Earl to WCRS's parent, Engine Group, for a reported £4m. Also in the UK, interactive agency Weapon7 was acquired for around £10m by Omnicom, and will become part of digital and direct group Zulu, whose other components include Claydon Heeley and Agency Republic.

It was a quiet week for account assignments. Hertz handed pan-European advertising to RKCR/Y&R London; while HP appointed Modem Media to overhaul its customer services websites in the region. Subscribers can access the full Adbrands Account Assignments database here.

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

Regards


Simon Tesler
Publisher, Adbrands

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