Mediacom Malaysia tipped to win Celcom media business

Industry sources with knowledge of the matter told Campaign Asia-Pacific that the account has been awarded to MediaCom following a pitch. Competitors included incumbent Zenith, which had held the account for 10 years.

Other agencies involved in the pitch included OMD and Carat. The scope of the business covers media planning and buying for the telco brand within Malaysia.

Zenith is still managing media matters for Celcom, with the official handover of duties slated for July, according to sources. GroupM Malaysia declined to comment when contacted.

Celcom’s business comes under MediaCom’s wing following DiGi Telecommunications awarding its media and digital business to Mindshare Malaysia in March and m/Six Malaysia’s appointment as Packet One Networks (P1)’s media agency in October last year.

WiMax operator P1, a subsidiary of Telekom Malaysia, rebranded itself as a mobile digital service provider Webe in mid-April.

The Celcom win is also makes for some vindication for GroupM, as Mindshare Malaysia lost Maxis’ media business to IPG Mediabrands subsidiary Initiative in September last year. Mindshare had held the account for 10 years prior.

According to Nielsen’s Adex report for 2015, advertising expenditure by different telco brands in 2015 were as follows:

• Maxis: RM254 million (US$64.8 million)
• DiGi: RM115 million (US$29.34 million)
• Celcom: RM99 million (US$25.26 million)
• Telekom Malaysia: RM48 million (US$12.25 million)
• U Mobile: RM45 million (US$11.48 million)

However the adex figures, based on officially reported rate-card figures, do not include outdoor and digital spending.