MDC Confirms Penn's Appointment as CEO

The Stagwell Group, owner of the Harris and Harris Poll brands, has confirmed its $100m investment in marcoms group MDC Partners, with Stagwell founder Mark Penn named as MDC's Chief Executive.

Originally reported in the Wall Street Journal earlier this month, the investment and appointment concludes MDC Partners' strategic review process and CEO search, initiated last September. Penn (pictured) brings more than 40 years of experience in research, advertising, PR, polling and consulting. Before founding The Stagwell Group, he worked at Microsoft as EVP and Chief Strategy Officer, responsible for working across the firm's products, value propositions and investments, while leading its competitive research and analysis. Before this, he was the co-founder and CEO of MR agency Penn Schoen Berland, selling this to WPP and becoming CEO of WPP PR agency Burson-Marsteller. During his career, Penn has also served as a senior adviser to Bill Gates, UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, Senator Hillary Clinton and President Bill Clinton.

In his new role, Penn will lead all day-to-day operations at MDC, while continuing to oversee investments at The Stagwell Media LP fund. Irwin Simon, Presiding Director of the MDC Partners Board of Directors, comments: 'We are delighted to welcome both Mark as CEO of MDC Partners, and The Stagwell Group as a long-term strategic investor. Mark shares our vision and our values, and his background as a marketer, agency founder, global thought leader and investor will be critical to bolstering our structure, solutions and services. At the same time, the financial flexibility and resources provided by this investment will allow for a strengthened capital structure as well as the liquidity to selectively invest behind our world-class talent while focusing on high-priority growth areas'.

Web sites: www.stagwellgroup.com and www.mdc-partners.com .