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December 19, 2021
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including Asharq Al-Awsat, Asharq News and Arab News, and has a combined monthly reach of 165 million – announced a transformation strategy focusing on platform expansion, international partnerships and strategic investments across five key business verticals. In August it announced the acquisition of a 51 per cent controlling stake in Arabic podcast platform Thmanyah, and in October it launched a publishing arm, Raff Publishing.
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In September the GCC chapter of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) released for the first time a study that revealed the investment of digital adspend in the region. The study revealed that the total digital adspend in MENA in 2020 was $3.64bn. Other findings included that the growth of social and video in MENA has led the region to be ahead of other more ‘mature’ markets even though the MENA region is still considered an emerging digital ad market. The IAB GCC study is one of the first to try to size programmatic spending.
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In February Edmond Moutran, the founder of Memac Ogilvy, passed away. Moutran, who was born in 1944, joined Bahrain-based Intermarkets in 1973. In 1984 he left to establish his own agency, Middle East Marketing And Communications (Memac). In 1986 Memac entered into an affiliation with Ogilvy & Mather, and in 1998 renamed itself Memac Ogilvy when the WPP-owned network took a minority stake. In 2014 Ogilvy took a majority stake, but Moutran stayed involved, only stepping aside from his CEO role in 2017 to become executive chairman.
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In July Saudi Research & Media Group (SRMG) – which owns more than 30 major media outlets
In October WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook resumed services after being down for more than six hours in a major outage. Reuters reported that Facebook blamed a faulty configuration change for this outage that prevented the company’s 3.5 billion users from accessing its social media and messaging services. 17
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In November Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg introduced Meta, which brings together all the company’s apps and technologies under one new company brand. Meta’s focus will be “to bring the metaverse to life and help people connect, find communities and grow businesses,” said the newly rebranded company in a statement. In February news broke that, after 2024, Saudi Arabia will no longer allow its public sector to contract with foreign firms that do not have their regional headquarters sited in the kingdom.
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In January Publicis Groupe held talks about a possible sale or transaction with a private equity investor. In March Publicis Groupe’s share price rose on fresh M&A speculation, this time involving Havas owner Vivendi. Publicis Groupe’s shares rose 3 per cent to about 52 euros, following a report that said the ad agency group had discussions with Vivendi. In October Publicis Groupe overtook Omnicom and WPP to become the world’s most valuable agency group, after performing better than its two largest rivals since the start of the pandemic. Publicis Groupe’s stock market value had risen to more than $16.3bn. That compared with Omnicom, previously the biggest agency group, on $15.1bn and WPP on $15.4bn. 20
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In January Cannes Lions announced plans for the year’s International Festival of Creativity to take place at an in-person event in June. However, in April, amid ongoing concerns around the safety of international travel and large-scale events during the coronavirus pandemic, Lions announced that Cannes Lions 2021 would be fully digital, running as Cannes Lions Live.
In June Cannes Lions announced all the winners of the 2021 awards. The MENA region collected Gold, Silver and Bronze across different categories. The UAE, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Egypt collected awards. MEMAC Ogilvy, Dubai won Gold with Buy With Your Time for Ikea in Direct. Leo Burnett Beirut won Gold for Baklava Got Legs for #Safetyforsafekeeper in Entertainment and Impact BBDO Dubai won Gold with The New National Anthem Edition for An Nahar newspaper in Brand Experience and Activation.
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In November at the annual Loeries Awards, held in Cape Town, South Africa, and celebrating the best work from Africa and the Middle East, the MENA region did well. Havas Middle East’s Liquid Billboard for Adidas picked up the Out-Of-Home Grand Prix, and the UAE Media Office’s work with MullenLowe and TBWA\RAAD also picked up a number of prizes. Among
