REG - M&C Saatchi PLC - AGM Statement

Released : 10/06/2010 13:30

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RNS Number : 4102N
M&C Saatchi PLC
10 June 2010 
 
10 June 2010 
 
AGM Statement 
 
M&C Saatchi PLC ("M&C Saatchi" or "the Company") 
 
The Chairman of M&C Saatchi, Jeremy Sinclair, will make the following statement at today's Annual General Meeting: 
 
"A good start has been made in 2010 and we believe the Company's performance for the full year remains in line with our
expectations. Trading and visibility continues to be challenging, although we have seen some positive upturns in our
consultancy business and new business activity. 
 
During 2009 in what could have been the worst ever downturn, the Group did well to keep its revenues to a 1% decline. Our
clients should be congratulated on their refusal to be pushed into knee jerk budget cuts. Our staff too deserve
congratulations for their hard work in these hard times. 
 
Our three new offices - Switzerland, Brazil and Japan- have inevitably reduced profits, but we believe in the long run the
investments will prove to be well worthwhile. In 2009 they made an operating loss of £1.4m and contributed £0.8m to
revenues. 
 
Excluding new offices, the Group's operating profit was £11.6m - not a spectacular figure, but much better than we feared
in the dark days of early 2009. 
 
Since the close of 2009 we have opened new offices in Italy and in South Africa both of which we expect to do rather well,
given the quality of the teams joining us. We have also expanded our presence in Greater China with a fourth office, in
Guangzhou. 
 
As announced in March, we have sold a 20% stake in the Australian agency to local management. The idea behind the move is
that the more our people are masters and mistresses of their business, the better we all do. If successful, we intend to
repeat this exercise elsewhere. 
 
Certainly we aim to enshrine the entrepreneurial spirit in the future managers of the business. We pick our new graduates
from those who most want to lead, to be 'masters of their own destiny' and then we train them to make the most of their
talent. 
 
Finally, it is with great regret that we saw our Founding Finance Director, Jerry Wales, move onto pastures new. His
contribution to our style and substance has been outstanding. We wish him well and equally wish our new Finance Director,
Jamie Hewitt, the very best of luck.I would also like to welcome Jonathan Goldstein to our board as our third non-executive
director. Jonathan is currently Deputy Chief Executive of Heron International, but was for many years our trusted counsel 
and advisor at Olswang." 
 
- ends - 
 
For further information, please contact: 
 
M&C Saatchi plc 
 
Jeremy Sinclair, Chairman            +44 (0)20 7543 4500 
 
David Kershaw, Chief Executive 
 
Numis Securities Ltd                      +44 (0)20 7260 1000 
 
Brent Nabbs, NOMAD 
 
Charles Farquhar, Corporate Broking 
 
Tulchan Communications               +44 (0)20 7353 4200 
 
Susanna Voyle 
 
Tom Ryner 
 
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange