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Twelve months after the merger with Incepta, Daniel Rogers gauges the performance of the expanded group and its plans forfuture growth
It was a year ago this week that Huntsworth 's merger with Incepta propelled Lord Chadlington (formerly Peter Gummer) back into the big league of PR consultancies.
Having presided over the rise and fall of the Shandwick PR behemoth during the 1980s and 90s, his effective takeover of the troubled Incepta in April 2005 led him once more to the helm of the largest UK-based PR group.
Today, as the group announces its first year's results, global fee income for 2006 is set to reach £ 140m.
Headquartered in modest offices in Huntsworth Mews, a short walk from London's Baker Street, chief executive Chadlington, his executive committee of seven, and around a dozen support staff, now oversee a powerful gathering of agencies. They range from the pinstriped Citigate Dewe Rogerson to the consumer-focused The Red Consultancy.
Chadlington himself has never seemed happier. There is a tell-tale sparkle in his eyes when he talks of vying globally with Martin Sorrell's WPP and his fellow Conservative peer Tim Bell, chairman of Chime.
Most intriguingly, Huntsworth is taking an opposing business strategy to that of Chime, focusing almost purely on PR. So while Chime was snapping up advertising agency VCCP last year, Huntsworth was busy disposing of most of its non-PR interests, selling Incepta Marketing Intelligence to Media Square in October 2005 (PRWeek, 30 September 2005).
And while Chime's PR division - recently rebranded as the Bell Pottinger Group (PRWeek, 17 March) - contributes 63 per cent of Chime's operating income, Huntsworth's PR interests represent more than 90 per cent of its revenue. Forty-four per cent of this comes from financial communications and public affairs, 42 per cent from full-service PR businesses, and the rest from healthcare PR.
Our clients know we will not try to sell them other channels of communication,' explains Chadlington. 'We are a PR company, which also has a specialisation in healthcare, and this is why the quality of our work, our people and our business is improving so quickly. Focus is everything.'
Clearly Chadlington is accepting that PR...