Publicis Groupe [Euronext Paris: FR0000130577] has announced the acquisition of Berlin-based leading business-to-business (B2B) integrated marketing agency zweimaleins GmbH. The agency will be integrated into Saatchi & Saatchi to create Saatchi & Saatchi Pro, a B2B-focused agency with more than 40 specialists serving Saatchi & Saatchi clients in Germany and greater Europe. With this acquisition the agency also creates a new digital hub and strengthens its presence in Berlin significantly.

Founded in 1995 by Alexander Stendel, zweimaleins has been built into a leading B2B agency with a focus on the digital and experiential sector and has been generating profitable growth every year for the last 7 years. B2B has consistently been a significant and growing part of the German marketing sector.

zweimaleins’ clients include Deutsche Telekom, with whom they have partnered since 1997, along with Commerzbank, T-Systems, BASF and Pepperl+Fuchs, and many others. The zweimaleins team will integrate completely with Saatchi & Saatchi Berlin and partner the Saatchi & Saatchi client network through their offices in Frankfurt and Dusseldorf. Alexander Stendel will lead Saatchi & Saatchi Pro as Managing Director. He will also hold the position of Chief Technology Officer of Saatchi & Saatchi Germany, heading the new Saatchi & Saatchi digital hub in Berlin. Alexander Stendel will report directly to Christian Rätsch, CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi Germany.

Christian Rätsch explains: “I believe that we now have the potential to become the most successful agency for communication services in the B2B sector in the next three years. Additionally, through the digital competence of zweimaleins, Saatchi & Saatchi Germany should generate 60 percent of its revenues with digital services by 2017. With the combined knowhow of zweimaleins and Saatchi & Saatchi we can offer a unique service portfolio to all our clients and generate benefits.”

He continues : “Saatchi & Saatchi continues to go from strength to strength in Germany with an amazing client portfolio including Toyota, P&G, Merck and CosmosDirekt. Today the majority of our revenue is based on communications direct to consumers. While this has been successful we have not been accessing the huge market in Germany for B2B communications as strongly as we could have. The acquisition and integration of zweimaleins to create Saatchi & Saatchi Pro enables this. This launch will unlock significant growth for us both in the form of new clients and to be able to serve the B2B needs of our current Saatchi & Saatchi client base.”

Alexander Stendel said: “We are very proud to build and live our vision of B2B and digital communications together with Saatchi & Saatchi. Our two agencies complement each other as a perfect match. All of our clients can now benefit from an extensive end-to-end service support – from digital and classical creative work and strategy over brand management to international rollouts of campaigns.”

Justin Billingsley, Chief Operating Officer for Saatchi & Saatchi EMEA added: “Saatchi & Saatchi Pro is the first dedicated B2B agency in the network. This is not only big news for us in Berlin, and in Germany, where there is massive potential, but working out also how we can expand this model to serve the B2B needs of our clients in Europe and beyond. There’s B2B and B2C – but really it all comes down to P2P – people connecting with people. This is what Saatchi & Saatchi have always excelled at and the addition of these new capabilities and channels will only enhance this further.”

Photo (L to r): Christian Rätsch and Alexander Stendel