Publicis & Hal Riney Flexes Global Muscle

Publicis & Hal Riney will handle its first global account, Hewlett-Packard’s personal computer division, out of its office here.
Sources said the agency will be staffing up “significantly” to meet the demands of the estimated $25-30 million “global branding assignment,” which it wrested this month from Saatchi & Saatchi in San Francisco.
The win is significant for Riney, which had been unable to land global accounts as an independent agency. The shop was acquired earlier this year by Paris-based Publicis–which handles some H-P work in Europe–in a deal that the latter’s chairman, Maurice Lƒvy, said offered Riney and its clients a “gateway to the world” [Adweek, May 18].