Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP, was on Bloomberg the other night. He talks about his leveraged crisis, which he admittedly caused in the 1990s when he took over Ogilvy. He walks his way through the 2001 internet burst into this sticky economic boom of 2008. He’s been calling 2009 tough and he does it again here. Although, he’s saying recovery will hit us in 2010 and that President Obama’s planned stimulus is enough to do the job. “Our kids and grandkids are going to be in an extremely difficult position with these massive deficits.” Aw. He’s got a heart! He also says the gap between the West and the East, financially, will continue to shrink. Aw. The world comes together!
He spends the last half of the interview talking about how WPP is competitive with its $15B dollar in revenue. By the way, $4B of that he’s saying is in “consumer insights” such as companies like TNS. The interview rolls on into Google frenemy status, SEO and some other junk.
Ever notice how much press Maurice Levy and Sorrell do? Hey. They are CEOs. That’s what they are supposed to do, but where’s John Wren, CEO of Omnicom? Is he gun shy? Is he all “Omnicom is the brand, not the CEO?”