Starcom MediaVest Group (SMG) Middle East and North Africa is a regional bastion of media planning and research and part of the Paris-based Publicis Group. In 2012, it was regional market share leader in provision of media services according to Ipsos Stat. Executive tracked down MENA Managing Director Tarek Daouk at SMG’s regional head office in Dubai Media City.
- One of the business hopes in 2012 was the digital sphere. Did growth of digital fulfill the aspirations of last year?
Yes, in terms of spend and revenue it was growing very fast. The biggest challenge that we have is either finding talent or readjusting our existing talents to handle the digital part.
How about the market’s receptiveness for digital offerings?
We are now at a stage where we don’t have to sell. Demand is coming; the issue is adapting to it and servicing it properly.
- You are part of a generation of more institutional managers in the regional media industry. What is your generation’s main contribution to developing the advertising and communications media ecosphere in the Middle East and North Africa?
Our key contribution is modernization. We are the middle generation that saw life before and after the [arrival of the] Internet. We are the bridge between the founders’ generation that established the industry and brought it to scale, and the generation that lives only since the Internet existed. This, although it differs from company to company, is also the generation that will hopefully see the 100 percent mergers of the family businesses into the multinationals.
- So you are expecting scenarios to cease of multinational majorities and local minority shareholdings in MENA advertising groups?
Yes, at a moment in time when it fits the shareholders. For us [as SMG] we always had 100 percent corporate ownership. I am talking about my generation, where there are people like me in every single company, and some of them are probably the children of the founders, who are playing the same game of how to modernize and how to prepare for the day when they are 100 percent owned.
- As the alignment between SMG and the global corporation has been progressing, has there also been an influx of Lebanese into the global organization?
Yes, we have several cases where some of us went to global roles. Our previous CEO, Filip Jabbour, is now the global head for business development for SMG worldwide. Filip moved from Dubai to take a global role and he is now based in Chicago. One of the reasons for this is that the emerging markets are the hope for the global companies. Emerging markets, and MENA playing a significant role among them, get attention. And if there is attention to the business, there will be attention to the people, and people who succeed will get global cases.
- Do you expect that regional companies, when talking about clients, might become more active in communicating their brands and products from the region into global markets? Is it conceivable that a regional company could, for example, buy a spot in the Super Bowl in any of the coming years?
They don’t have to buy in the Super Bowl but some companies are expanding. Emirates [Airline] is a perfect example. It reflects the United Arab Emirates culture but it is a global company and it invests in markets that are important for it across the world.
- Do you see a possibility for this outreach of institutions and state-affiliate companies to broaden into more industries?
The retail sector, specifically the entertainment sector in Dubai. The malls might start looking into this because you are seeing a significant influx of tourists.
- What main difference do you see between the young Lebanese who enter into the regional ad industry today and your generation?
Among the millennial Lebanese who come into the regional ad industry today, I see more of them choosing not to enroll in big corporations and overall, a greater desire to do their own business. The ecosystem today is more favorable to entrepreneurship. It doesn’t mean all people are going that way, but the desire for entrepreneurship is much bigger than in my generation. I also think it is a natural trend in recessions that people are more determined to create their own opportunities.
