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Lowe's Argentinean creative boutique VegaOlmosPonce has a new spot out for an anti-bacterial soap from Unilever, being marketed in most countries under the Rexona brand (also known as Sure in the UK and Degree in the US). What a clever idea this is. Typically inventive and original. We wonder what will happen now to VegaOlmosPonce (and to Lowe) in the wake of creative guru Fernando Vega Olmos' departure for JWT. 

More magic from Wieden & Kennedy, who seem to turn out another new ad for Nike every week of the year. And every one (more or less) a work of genius. The stunning new film for Nike Basketball stars LeBron James, and is built around his well-known pre-game ritual of tossing talcum powder at the scorers' board. There are appearances from various other NBA superstars (as well as hip hop star Lil Wayne). Extraordinary. 

I am absolutely certain that we have never featured an ad from the Eastern European republic of Macedonia in Adbrands Ads of the Week. Until now. We bow to this witty little spot for mobile service Cosmofon, courtesy of New Moment New Ideas Y&R in Skopje. 

And finally, the return of an old classic. This wonderful ad for Lego was first released in 1981, and was reissued at the end of last month for a limited engagement in British cinemas. Just goes to show that techniques may change over the years, but great ideas never really go out-of-date. The original TBWA London created the ad. Narration is of course by the great British comedian and magician Tommy Cooper. 

In the news this past week: Advertisers

America's big three carmakers are back in Washington this week in a desperate attempt to persuade lawmakers that their proposed business plans can restore long-term profitability and therefore merit $34bn of financial aid. GM and Chrysler both said they will be forced into bankruptcy before Christmas if they don't receive immediate state aid, and they warned of a catastrophic knock-on effect on the domestic economy. All three companies are promising to consolidate production facilities, and hasten a shift towards smaller, less gas-hungry vehicles. In addition, GM announced plans to cut its portfolio of brands by half to just four marques. Saturn, Pontiac and Saab will be sold or closed; Hummer is already up for sale. (GM has yet to explain how it will agree terms with its dealer networks if it is forced to terminate those marques. When it bought out Oldsmobile dealers a few years ago, the company paid out around $2bn in compensation). Meanwhile Ford confirmed plans to sell off its own Swedish subsidiary Volvo. Both US groups are also seeking financial support from the Swedish government to assist with the sale of their local operations in that country. However, immediate cash assistance and cutbacks are far from certain to resolve the groups' problems if sales continue to belly-flop. November proved to be another disastrous month for all the major car makers. GM, Chrysler and Nissan's sales all fell by more than 40% compared to the same month last year. Ford, Toyota and Honda each reported declines of more than 30%. Many financial experts are telling lawmakers that bankruptcy would be a far more efficient way to create smaller and more viable carmakers. See General Motors, Ford, Chrysler profiles on Adbrands.

There was more merger activity in the airline industry. British Airways was revealed to be in discussion to combine with its long-standing Australian ally Qantas. The problem is how to get around regulations which currently prevent any single foreign investor from owning more than 25% of an Australian airline. However the Australian government has said it would consider changing those laws provided any deal left at least 51% of Qantas in local ownership. BA has also been involved with similar talks with Iberia of Spain, although it is unlikely to be able to pull off both deals. Indeed, Iberia's chairman has now given BA an ultimatum to decide which of the two deals it will pursue. BA also hopes to get permission from regulators for a much broader partnership with American Airlines. Meanwhile Ryanair has submitted a new offer to take control of its loss-making Irish rival Aer Lingus; and Lufthansa's board this week approved a plan to acquire struggling rival Austrian Airlines. See British Airways profile on Adbrands.

The horrific terrorist attacks in Mumbai dominated news headlines last weekend. The incident almost had devastating implications for packaged goods giant Unilever as well. Among the hundreds of guests trapped in the Taj Mahal hotel by the terrorists were most of Unilever's senior management team, including outgoing CEO Patrick Cescau and his successor Paul Polman. They were attending a dinner hosted by local subsidiary Hindustan Unilever to mark the handover of the CEO role. Although they had no direct contact with the terrorists, the Unilever guests barricaded themselves inside their banqueting room until rescued by police and fire-fighters in the early hours of Friday morning. See Unilever profile on Adbrands.

Administrators for failed UK retailer Woolworths are apparently wading through a deluge of offers for the group's retail outlets, with supermarkets Asda and Lidl said to be among the most eager bidders. In the mean time, however, the group's predicament has created a domino effect for other retailers. Woolworths subsidiary EUK was one of the country's biggest music and video wholesalers, and the group's collapse has left customers without supplies of new releases, including the latest albums from Britney Spears and Take That. Entertainment retailer Zavvi, formerly Virgin Megastores, has been forced to suspend all online sales while it attempts to source stock from another supplier. See also Woolworths, Asda, Lidl profiles on Adbrands.  

Nokia unveiled its first touchscreen smartphone, a response to Apple's iPhone and other similar devices. The N97 won't be available in Europe until Spring next year, but offers a slide-out keyboard, a camera and GPS and mapping facilities. Its most significant innovation is a personalised screen which can be populated with software "widgets" similar to those available on traditional computers. The initial response from industry observers was generally positive, although some highlighted the weight and thickness of the device compared to the iPhone. See Nokia, Apple profiles on Adbrands.

PepsiCo appointed Jill Beraud, formerly a senior marketer at lingerie company Victoria's Secret, to a new position as chief marketing officer for global accounts. She takes over centralised responsibility for all the group's global brands including Pepsi, Frito-Lay/Walkers and Tropicana. See PepsiCo, Victoria's Secret profiles on Adbrands.

In a stunning legal victory for Mattel, the makers of Barbie, a US court has ordered arch-rival MGA Entertainment to cease all future manufacture or marketing of its own line of Bratz fashion dolls. That ruling is likely to bring to a close a long-running legal battle between the two companies. Sales of Barbie have declined dramatically in recent years because of the emergence of the saucier, more streetwise Bratz figures. However, the Bratz were conceived and designed while their creator was still an employee of Mattel. As a result, the court agreed that the dolls' designs and concept legally belong to Mattel, not to MGA Entertainment, the independent company which was set up to commercialise them. The ruling is suspended until February 2009 to allow MGA to appeal. See Mattel profile on Adbrands.

Larry Young, CEO of US soft drink company Dr Pepper Snapple Group (DPSG), must be sincerely regretting his ill-advised pledge earlier this year to issue a free can of Dr Pepper to "everyone in America" if rock band Guns N Roses released their long-awaited 'Chinese Democracy' album during 2008. Despite the 17-year delay, Guns N Roses did indeed issue the record last month. Dr Pepper agreed to follow through on its pledge to anyone who registered for a coupon on its website on the day the album was released. However disaster ensued when the site was so deluged by users that it crashed repeatedly, preventing many fans from claiming their freebie. Guns N Roses frontman Axl Rose has himself now got involved in the situation, threatening a lawsuit against DPSG for unauthorised use of the band's name and complaining that the botched giveaway "soured the momentous musical event that was Chinese Democracy's release". He had demanded that the company publish an apology to fans in America's four biggest newspapers and fulfil its promise to give away a free can not just to those able to register online but literally "everyone in America". See Dr Pepper Snapple Group profile on Adbrands.

The New York Times carried a great article last week by Andrew Adam Newman which disclosed the unwritten rule of timepiece marketing. Newman was shopping for a watch on Amazon.com and suddenly noticed with a shock that virtually all of the top 100 men's watches pictured were set to the time of 10:10. "To be watch-shopping online and first notice that every model arrayed on the screen is set to an identical time can feel like crossing over into the Twilight Zone," he wrote. Yet the explanation is disarmingly simple. It is the acknowledged law of watch photography that the hands are always set to ten past ten. (Have a look at any watch ad if you doubt the rigidity of that rule). Since the manufacturer's logo is usually presented top and centre on the dial behind, that position offers an attractive frame for the brand, and also registers sub-consciously with viewers as a "smile". The only exceptions tend to be if that position would obscure other features, such as a secondary dial or date. Oddly enough, it wasn't always this way. Before World War II, most watches were pictured at 8:20, but that position was abandoned in our more psychologically perceptive age because it looked too much like a frown. Read the full article here.

In the news this past week: Agencies

What on earth is going on in the C-suite at Aegis, parent to media network Carat? The year has been punctuated by a series of abrupt departures, but the most surprising to-date is the sudden resignation of group CEO Robert Lerwill at the end of last week, apparently without a job to go to. As with the equally sudden departure of Aegis Media CEO Mainardo de Nardis in May, no satisfactory explanation has been given for the abrupt and apparently unplanned nature of the change. Non-executive chairman John Napier will replace Lerwill on an interim basis, but some media reports have suggested that no fulltime successor will be appointed. There have been rumours of "fundamental differences" between Napier and Lerwill over group strategy, and these appear to centre on the repeated attempts by Havas chairman Vincent Bolloré to win a seat on the Aegis board. In addition, Aegis recently lost the consolidated Renault media budget for Europe to OMD, where it will be overseen by none other than Mainardo de Nardis himself, soon to become CEO. Aegis shareholders experienced a surge of confidence over the likelihood of a renewed takeover bid from Bolloré, sending the group's shares up by as much as 20%. See also Aegis, OMD profiles on Adbrands. 

London creative agency Beattie McGuinness Bungay has agreed the sale of a 49% shareholding to the Korean marketing group Cheil Worldwide for an undisclosed sum. It will become the main UK outpost for Cheil, and will take over local management of the Korean company's flagship account, Samsung, currently handled here by Leo Burnett and CHI. Cheil also has plans to build a small international network for BMB, starting with an office in New York, followed by Sao Paolo and Singapore. The deal was negotiated by Cheil's recently appointed global chief operating officer Bruce Haines, former  head of Leo Burnett London. The deal is a stunning coup for BMB. In September the company came close to selling out to Omnicom, in a deal which would have allowed BMB's three founders to take over control of TBWA's London office, from which they jumped ship three years ago. That deal collapsed at the last minute, apparently over a disagreement on price. See BMB, Cheil, Samsung profiles on Adbrands.

The fallout from Johnson & Johnson's decision to consolidate all its pharmaceutical advertising into Interpublic and WPP agencies has begun to settle this week. The main loser is Omnicom, several of whose healthcare agencies worked on J&J accounts. The biggest blow was to KPR Communications, one of the industry's first healthcare agencies when it was founded in 1962. The loss of its Centocor account has precipitated the agency's closure. Some staff will transfer to other Omnicom agencies, such as Harrison & Star. See Johnson & Johnson, KPR, Harrison & Star profiles on Adbrands.

In other assignments, InBev has consolidated global advertising for its Stella Artois brand with Mother. The London shop also collected the UK account for the Energy Saving Trust. Challenger mobile brand 3 has appointed digital shop Glue London as its lead creative agency in the UK, ousting Euro RSCG. Boots handed CRM for its Advantage loyatly scheme to M&C Saatchi's Lida. For all other appointments, subscribers can access the full Adbrands Account Assignments database here. See InBev, Mother, Stella Artois, 3, Boots, M&C Saatchi profiles on Adbrands.

In the news this past week: Media

DMGT, which owns the UK's mid-market right-wing tabloid The Daily Mail as well as a large portfolio of regional titles, has agreed an unusual strategic alliance with The Independent, the smallest and weakest of Britain's quality broadsheets. The deal stops short of a full acquisition, but The Independent will move into DMGT's offices in West London and will transfer some of its back office operations to the bigger group. The two groups' commercial, editorial and management operations will remain separate. See DMGT profile on Adbrands.

It's getting hard to tell truth from fiction in the long-running Microsoft-Yahoo saga. A report in the UK's Sunday Times newspaper which announced that Microsoft had agreed to buy Yahoo's search division for $20bn turned out to be wishful thinking rather than fact, as yet at least. The report was described as "total fiction" by one of the executives named in the article as a member of a new Microsoft-Yahoo management team. Another story, this time in the WSJ, has former AOL chief Jonathan Miller in talks with various private equity investors to assemble backing for his own buyout of Yahoo. However that too may be groundless - US blog TechCrunch claims that Miller's AOL non-compete clause prohibits him from working at Yahoo until at least March next year. One true fact this week is the news that Yahoo's European CEO, Toby Coppel, is to leave the group in early 2009. He will be replaced by Rich Riley, currently head of Yahoo's advertiser & publisher group in Europe. See Microsoft, Yahoo profile on Adbrands.

As always, if you haven't already done so, please confirm your subscription to the free Adbrands Weekly Update by clicking here or on the link at the foot of this email. Thank you for your assistance! 

Simon Tesler
Publisher, Adbrands

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