Citigate appoints James Bishop to corporate team

Citigate Dewe Rogerson has hired Weber Shandwick’s James Bishop as a director in its corporate team. Bishop will work primarily with Citigate’s banking, insurance, pensions and investment clients. He joins following a stint in the United Arab Emirates working with Weber and H&K Strategies. Before moving to the Middle East, Bishop was based in London working with clients […]

Next 15 acquires marketing agency Twogether

Communications business Next 15 has acquired the B2B creative technology marketing agency Twogether for £6.6m. The acquisition forms part of Next 15’s strategy to act less like a parent company to its host of agencies including Lexis, Beyond and The OutCast Agency, and more like a venture capital firm. It specialises in acquiring, incubating and growing […]

Brace of promotions at Whitehouse

Issues-led comms specialist The Whitehouse Consultancy has strengthened its senior team with the promotion of senior consultants Katarzyna (Kasia) Wilk and Chris Rogers to associate director. Wilk will continue to lead the agency’s EU public affairs team and Rogers remains as head of Whitehouse’s PR unit. Wilk joined Whitehouse in 2011 having previously worked in the European Parliament […]

Cognito to support Money 20/20 Europe launch

Money 20/20, a conference on the future and ‘digitisation’ of money, has brought in Cognito to support the launch of its inaugural Europe event to be held in Copenhagen in April. As media partner of the inaugural Europe event, taking place from 4-7 April, Cognito will drive media partnerships and manage European media outreach. The event, which […]

Ad-blocking presents PR opportunity

Last week’s Guardian Changing Media Summit highlighted once again that ad-blocking, the practice of using software to remove banner ads from web pages, desktops and mobile phones when viewing content, is a major challenge for the media industry. However, the continued rise of ad-blocking could provide the PR industry with new opportunities, according to comms experts from Edelman and Propeller PR. At […]

Merlin hires Diageo’s Crampton as corporate affairs lead

Merlin Entertainments, which includes visitor attractions Alton Towers, LEGOLAND and Madame Tussauds, has hired Diageo’s James Crampton to the newly created position of corporate affairs director. Reporting into Alistair Windybank, the group’s IR and corporate affairs director, Crampton will have primary responsibility for media relations and internal comms across the group. He will also manage wider non-financial stakeholder relationships. Windybank said: […]

Start-up SalaryFinance expands brief for Clarity

FinTech company SalaryFinance, which was co-founded by former Google UK MD Dan Cobley, has brought in Clarity PR as its retained agency to raise awareness of its service. SalaryFinance allows working people to consolidate existing personal debt into a low cost loan, with repayments made via salary deductions. The company initially engaged Clarity PR to support the […]

Hartridges hires Fleet Street Communications

Fleet Street Communications has been appointed by soft drinks family business Hartridges to launch its new brand positioning, re-design and packaging. The agency has been briefed to raise the profile of the business to UK on-trade media, drive sales and promote the brand’s heritage and credentials. Fleet Street is to build brand awareness through a programme of tailored […]

Vivino wine app appoints Manifest London

Vivino, which claims to be the world’s most downloaded wine app, has brought in Manifest London to handle its UK PR. The Vivino app was created to “take the guesswork out of wine” and it allows people to benefit from a crowd-sourced database consisting of opinions from wine lovers at all level of expertise. Users can take a […]