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Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO and New PHD are expected to pick up the

pounds 15 million account to launch British Digital Broadcasting to

consumers next year. AMV, which pitched against Lowe Howard-Spink and

BMP DDB, is said to be the only agency still in talks with BDB, a joint

venture between Carlton and Granada Television.

The Mirror Group is to turn the Sporting Life into a general sports

daily newspaper. Len Gould, the editor of the People, will work on the

title. The announcement follows news of the Mirror Group’s agreement to

publish the specialist horse racing newspaper, the Racing Post.

Leagas Shafron Davis is buying back the minority stake held in it by the

Germany-based Wilkens network. The agency is exercising its right to

reclaim Wilkens’ 13 per cent shareholding after the network’s

acquisition by FCB earlier this year.

The International Advertising Festival is rumoured to be hiring an

executive from a US ad agency network as its new president. The

individual is about to retire from his present post. Romain Hatchuel,

son of Roger Hatchuel, the festival’s chairman, is its new director. The

appointment follows Charles Sciberras’s resignation last week. Roger

Hatchuel, who owns 10 per cent of the Cannes festival, now plans to be

less involved with the event.

Leo Burnett has lost the job of promoting the Queen’s Awards to

Industry. MBA, FCA! and Mellors Reay & Partners will pitch for the

pounds 300,000-a-year account next month as the COI seeks to use more

agencies with integrated marketing credentials. ’I anticipate our

pitch-lists will look a little different in future,’ the COI’s director

of marketing communications, Peter Buchanan, said.

Great Eastern Railway, which runs services from Essex and Suffolk into

London’s Liverpool Street station, is shortlisting agencies to pitch for

its pounds 1.5 million above-the-line account. The company, owned by

FirstBus, the Aberdeen-based bus and rail group, is carrying out a

review of all its marketing services.

Britain’s agencies were this week accused of closing their doors to

foreign job seekers because of ’cosy’ relationships with a select band

of recruitment consultants. The charges have been levelled by CV

Concern, a recruitment consultants’ pressure group, which has written to

more than 200 agency managing directors urging them to end restrictive

recruitment practices.

DMB&B’s ad for Procter & Gamble’s Always Ultra has been voted the worst

commercial on TV by readers of TV Quick magazine, who condemn it as

’distasteful and embarrassing’. A ’tacky’ series of ads by Grey for the

DFS furniture chain took second slot, while Leo Burnett’s ’doorstep

challenge’ films for P&G’s Daz took third place for being ’plain stupid

and pointless’.

Dean Weller, director of strategic planning and research at the Media

Business, has left the agency after 11 years without a job to go to. It

is believed that a replacement is being sought but no-one at the agency

was available for comment.

Brand development is becoming more important than ever, according to a

survey of senior management in Britain’s top companies unveiled this

week by KPMG Management Consulting. The report also finds that marketing

is evolving into more than just a departmental function and is beginning

to be regarded as a common focus for all employees.

The TV chef, Ainsley Harriot, features in a radio push developed by

Delaney Fletcher Bozell to help stop people getting food poisoning from

their own cooking this Christmas. Breaking next week, the campaign is a

joint initiative set up by the Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and

Food and the Department of Health.

John Smee, the chairman of Smee’s Advertising, died last week. His son,

Anthony, remains as chief executive of the agency. The funeral is today

(Thursday) at noon in Ruislip Crematorium. For further information

contact David Farbey on 0171-486 6644.

This article was first published on Campaign