Media Square

April 24 2009

UK marcoms group Media Square – which owns market research agency Illuminas – has appointed COO Bruce Winfield to its Board of Directors. Winfield will also be adding the role of Finance Director to his current duties, following the departure of Graeme Burns, who leaves the company and steps down from the Board at the end of June. Burns, who joined Media Square in 2002, will continue to work for the firm on a part-time basis and will hand over his responsibilities to Winfield during a phased handover programme. Winfield joined in 2004 and has been Group Chief Operating Officer since 2007. He has 30 years’ management experience gained at a number of multinational companies including Havas and British Airways. He also serves on the Board of several Media Square agencies. Executive Chairman Roger Parry comments: ‘Graeme has done a tremendous job in the last two years working with the new team in order to support the turnaround in Media Square. The restructuring is going well - despite the current economic conditions, and the group is now significantly simpler and smaller than it was a couple of years ago and the finance function is in robust shape.’ In February, Media Square announced it would be reducing its global headcount by around 9%, as part of a cost saving programme in response to a significant reduction in client spend. At the time, Illuminas Chairman Peter Reid told DRNO that his firm had experienced an exceptionally good year, despite the economic climate. Last year, Media Square sold its fieldwork agencies Viewpoint Field, Viewpoint Studios and The Wire to IQ Holdings. Just three weeks after the acquisition, IQ closed telephone and online data collection firm The Wire following discussions relating to the ‘substantial losses’ the firm had suffered in the previous two years’ trading. In addition, last month IQ announced a net loss of £440k for 2008. Web sites: www.mediasquare.co.uk and www.iqresearch.co.uk . Printer-friendly version of this article. Email this article to a friend. Register for News emails