WPP Returns to UK Trading; Buys Into Globant

In accordance with plans announced in November and ratified by shareholders last month, WPP has returned its tax headquarters to the UK. The group also announced it has taken a twenty percent stake in Buenos Aires-based digital marketing specialist Globant.

Dealings in 'New WPP' shares were due to begin on the London Stock Exchange this morning, and on New York's NASDAQ at opening time. WPP says the changes, first announced in August and approved by shareholders in mid-December, will not affect its day-to-day operations in any significant way.

CEO Sir Martin Sorrell meanwhile stepped into the controversy over the UK corporate taxes (not) paid by firms including Starbucks and Google, suggesting in an interview on BBC Radio 4's Today Programme that the amount of corporation tax companies pay is largely 'a question of judgement', reflecting concerns of social responsibility and brand-building rather than legal compulsion. He added: 'Every company we deal with without exception knows that doing good is good business, not because it's legislated'.

The group's latest interest - at a price of around $70 million - is in Globant, which provides an unusual combination of technical expertise and design and creative capabilities, developing of software products to assist global digital marketing campaigns. The firm employs 2,700 people, including engineers, marketing specialists and designers, in 21 offices across 14 cities in Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Colombia, the USA and the UK, and in 2011 had revenues of $US 90m.

Sorrell (pictured) said of the move: 'Increasingly, clients want better coordination between their IT departments and their marketing departments, between their Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and their Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs)... Partnering with Globant will allow our companies to increasingly provide our clients with insights and skills that will make their digital marketing efforts even more effective and simpler to manage at both the front and back ends.'

WPP also says this is 'very much the decade of Latin America' - citing the World Cup and the Olympics in particular. Its LATAM revenues, including associates, total over US $1.6bn and it employs more than 18,000 people there.

Globant CEO and co-founder Martin Migoya comments: 'Our core competencies in gamification, cloud computing, big data, social networks and mobile enable us to deliver innovation to our customers and add value to their efforts to reach end users through software products.'

Web sites: www.wpp.com and www.wppinvestor.com .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.

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