McCann wins £70m Siemens brief from J. Walter Thompson

J. Walter Thompson has lost its hold on Siemens Mobile Devices'

£70 million international account, following a realignment of the

business into McCann-Erickson Worldwide.

JWT lost creative leadership of the Siemens business when Wieden &

Kennedy Amsterdam was appointed to create a series of six ads last

November. However, the agency has since continued to work on the

account, adapting W&K's work for local markets across the globe. Siemens

spent £18 million through JWT in the UK last year.

McCann will now be asked to co-ordinate all global above- and

below-the-line activity in addition to the PR business already handled

by the network through the "corridor company", Weber Shandwick. The

account will be handled by McCann's Berlin agency, with major activity

expected to be concentrated in Germany, Italy, France, Spain and the

UK.

In a statement, Siemens said the review had been undertaken to

streamline its marketing and communications arrangements. It confirmed

that Wieden & Kennedy would remain the lead creative agency for all

above-the-line campaigns.

It is not clear whether the review will affect the position of Scholz &

Friends, which picked up the UK domestic appliance business in June.

This article was first published on Campaign