EDELMAN WINS MASTERCARD/LATIN AMER.

MasterCard International has picked Edelman PR Worldwide to handle its Latin American PR business.Burson-Marsteller and Brodeur Worldwide also pitched.

Jeffrey Group CEO Jeff Sharlach resigned the "significant six-figure account" in February after a five-year run. MasterCard had asked his firm to stay on through August, according to Sharlach.

Edelman won the business because it offered a compelling mix of regional and local PR messages, according to Marcus Molina, MC's VP-PR and communications for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Edelman, which currently handles MasterCard in Brazil, will also do in-country programs in Argentina and Mexico. Vivian Hirsch is in charge of Edelman/Latin America.

Waggener Edstrom is responsible for MasterCard's U.S. PR account.

BAHAMAS STAYS AT WEBER SHANDWICK

The Bahamas Ministry of Tourism has renewed its $50,000 a-month PR account at Weber Shandwick, Adrian Archer, the Ministry's PR manager, told this NL. The recent change in government spurred speculation that the travel account was "loose," but Archer says the Ministry is quite pleased with WS' work on the business.

The Government has given ad agency Bozell and trade promo shop Irma S. Mann Strategic Marketing notice that their business is being reviewed.

Rene Mack, president/travel & lifestyle marketing practice at WS, said his practice is holding up despite the widespread travel slump. "We are looking to hire people," he said.

WS travel clients include Singapore Airlines, Marriott International, Hilton Head Island, and Canadian Tourism Commission.

BRASHEAR JOINS H&K

Albert "Rusty" Brashear, who was Motorola's global communications chief, is now senior counselor in Hill and Knowlton's corporate practice. Harlan Teller, H&K's corporate practice president, hailed Brashear as a "longtime friend and client."

The 59-year-old Brashear retired from Motorola in April. He also was White House deputy press secretary during the Reagan Administration and the top spokesperson for the Environmental Protection Agency.

PUBLICIS EYES LAYOFFS

Publicis CEO Maurice Levy says a round of layoffs may be in the works following the Sept. 20 completion of the Bcom3 Group acquisition.

The cutbacks are needed to reach Publicis' goal of achieving a 15 percent profit margin, the Frenchman told The Wall Street Journal.

Neither Publicis nor Bcom3, said Levy, are that profitable because of the "difficult" business conditions.

The firm was to release its first-half financials on Sept. 10. Employment at the combined entities is about 38,000.

Levy says he wants firms, such as Bcom3's Manning, Selvage & Lee, to retain their own identities following the merger. Publicis has promised Bcom3 managers that it would respect "their personalities, clients and brand identities."

Levy, last month, said Publicis will take a breather on the acquisition front in the wake of the Bcom3 deal. His firm is the No. 4 ad/PR combine with revenues in the $4 billion range.

F-H DOES CRISIS WORK FOR CRYOLIFE

CryoLife, the embattled supplier of human tissue for implantation, has brought on Fleishman-Hillard to deal with issues surrounding an FDA recall charging that its implant products could be linked to death or serious infections.

F-H said it was brought on after the Aug. 13 Food and Drug Administration recall, which ordered the company to pull all soft tissue processed since Oct. 3.

CryoLife, which has laid off a quarter of its 384 employees because of the recall, struck a deal last week with the FDA under which it can sell tissue for medically urgent use if all other treatments are unavailable or inappropriate.

JACKSON LANDS AT FEDEX

Fedex Corp. has named Eric Jackson VP-communications. He reports to Bill Margaritis, VP-worldwide communications/IR.

Jackson, who was managing director-corporate communications at Siemens Corp., is in charge of the $21 billion delivery service's media relations, community relations, internal PR, issue/crisis management and executive communications.

Heyman Assocs. placed Jackson. Elisabeth Ryan, senior VP, headed the search.

SAUDI ARABIA SAYS IT'S A TERROR VICTIM

Saudi Arabia says it is a full partner in President Bush's "war on terror," and a victim of terrorism, according to a document that Patton Boggs has distributed to staffers on Capitol Hill.

The Embassy's "Background FAQ" deals with "hot button" issues such as "Saudi Support for Osama bin Laden," "Alleged Saudi Funding for Terrorism," "Saudi Freezing of Assets," "Saudi Education System and Anti-Americanism," "Saudi Arabia and Suicide Bombers," and "Stability in Saudi Arabia."
Here are highlights:

Re: bin Laden. "Osama bin Laden is a dissenter who has taken the side of evil. His citizenship was revoked in the early 1990s on account of his irresponsible acts and he remains unpopular among our citizens. As a nation, we are horrified by his actions and we reject what he and his followers stand for. They are deviants and criminals whose actions we strongly reject. People must understand that we are also victims of Osama bin Laden's terrorist acts."

Re: terror funding. "The Crown Prince has said unequivocally-`No honorable man would accept terrorism.' Saudi Arabia does not support or contribute to terrorism. We never have, and we never will. Terrorism is against our religion and culture, and we have been victims of it for the past four decades. We monitor all financial transactions to ensure that no money goes to evildoers."

Re: education system. "Our educational system does not teach anti-American doctrines and hatred of the West. Islam teaches peace, amicability and tolerance, not violence and hatred. As Saudis and Muslims, we wish to establish friendly relations that serve mutual interests in all spheres. The involvement of Saudi citizens in the September 11 acts of terrorism was shocking to us. It is important to understand that these individuals were deviants and criminals. They do not represent the people of Saudi Arabia or Islam any more than Jim Jones or Branch Davidians represent America or Christianity."

Re: stability. "The goal of the Saudi government is to take care of its people, and to create the environment in which they can lead productive, useful lives. Our achievements speak for themselves: over the past thirty years alone, we have invested over $1.2 trillion to transform our country from a sandbox into a modern, viable nation."

Patton Boggs received $170K from Saudi Arabia for the first-half of this year for distributing the statement and for explaining the Kingdom's role in the "war on terror," its position on human rights and the treatment of women, energy policies and educational reform. Qorvis Communications, a PB affiliate, does PR for the Embassy.

Dell Computer Corp., Round Rock, Tex., has contacted top PR executives via a recruiter about a possible opening. Search may or may not affect Elizabeth Allen, who joined as VP-CC more than two years ago from Staples. Dell wouldn't comment.

N.J.'S HOMELAND SECURITY CHIEF TO MWW

MWW Group has hired Golan Cipel, who was New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey's homeland security director, as head of its Israeli practice. He succeeds Ronn Torossian, who last month joined KCSA.

Cipel, 33, resigned his $110K a-year security post in March after it was disclosed that he lacked credentials and clearance for the post. He then assumed the role of "policy counselor" to the Governor. The Israeli national was a key campaign aide to McGreevey. Cipel also was a spokesperson for the Israeli Consulate in New York, and the mayor of Rishon le Zion. He received a job reference from the Governor.

MWW's hiring of Cipel, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, may spark another wave of controversy. It noted that MWW represents Parsons Infrastructure & Technology Group, the company that runs New Jersey's car inspection system. Parsons has been accused of botching the state's emission inspection system, and McGreevey has threatened to cancel that contract.

A McGreevey spokesperson said the Administration will not treat MWW and its clients any differently now that Cipel is on board at the Golin/Harris International unit.

LERACH, WHO SUED OMC & IPG, PROFILED

Bill Lerach, whose firm has launched class action lawsuits against Omnicom and Interpublic, is profiled in the Sept. 9 New Yorker.

Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach is portrayed as the dominant force in securities litigation, filing half or more of the cases nationwide and 80% of those in California, where it is based.

The 200-lawyer firm made an estimated $650 million dollars in profits in the 1990's. It was able to survive the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1996, commonly thought to be a bill specifically designed to cripple the firm's main source of income, and made a $50 million cash settlement in 1999 after being sued for abuse of process.

Milberg Weiss sued the Chicago consulting firm of Lexecon and Prof. Daniel Fischel of the University of Chicago law school. They sued the firm back.

The accounting industry, National IR Institute and other business groups called PSLRA the "Safe Harbor" act. Lerach told the New Yorker it was "just propaganda for the corporate community."

Defendants in class action suits can now move for immediate dismissal of the charges, preventing firms such as Milberg Weiss from issuing subpoenas and taking depositions at the outset. Rather than face such a costly ordeal, many defendants had settled out of court.

Lead law firms are now selected on the basis of which one has signed up complainants with the biggest losses. Milberg Weiss, with its experience and track record of success, is handling the Enron, Qwest and other major class action suits. The lead law firm has yet to be chosen for in the IPG and OMC cases.

SOME 'SCOOPS' ARE PLACEMENTS

"Strategic placement" is a new PR tactic used to describe the timing of scoops in The Wall Street Journaland The New York Times, according to Dan Fost of The San Francisco Chronicle.

Fost traces the start of strategic placements to May 2000 when the news about UAL Corp.'s merger was leaked to the Journal, The Times and The Washington Post,on the condition that they not call anyone else for comment, or publish the story before midnight.

Critics of such orchestrated scoops say they can be a disservice to the public and journalism because it allows corporations to manage the news, said Fost in his Sept. 1 article.

Fost said the phrase-strategic placement-is widely credited to Joele Frank, a Wall Street publicist, who declined to comment.

One publicist said the leaks used to come with strings attached. "To be fed a scoop, reporters were forbidden from talking to other sources," said Fost. "The press ultimately tired of such restrictions, resenting the loss of independence, and companies rarely put such conditions on their leaks anymore."

The don't have to, according to a PR executive, who told Fost "(Reporters) don't want to call out (to other sources) because it'll destroy their scoop." Thus, scoops about a pending merger often have no critical commentary about the deal, the unnamed publicist said.

PR PROS TAKE A VACATION FROM VOICE MAIL

Ginia Bellafante, a New York Times reporter, said she had uncovered an unusual number of voice mail messages this summer from people who said they could not be reached while on vacation.

Bellafante cited two instances in which she was unable to reach PR people.

One of them was the PR director of Barney's New York, who informed callers that the person called was out of the office until Sept. 3. "During this time period, I will not be checking my messages," the publicist said.

The other was a publicist at Arista Records, who left a message that said she was out of the country. "There was a time when I'd go away and check my voice mail religiously. I stopped," the publicist, Marlynn Snyder, said.

PEOPLE

David Jackson, a former Time magazine correspondent, has replaced Robert Reilly as director of Voice of America. Jackson has been editor of the Pentagon's anti-terror website since retiring from Time last year.

Olivia Barker, a reporter for USA Today, will participate in two nights of preliminary competition leading up to the Miss America Pageant on Sept. 21. She will appear in the talent and evening wear contests.

Jeremy Langmead was named editor of Time Inc.'s Wallpaper magazine, replacing founding editor, Tyler Brule. Langmead currently oversees the lifestyles features desk at The London Evening Standard.

Larry Elder's radio show, which has aired for eight years on KABC-AM in Los Angeles, will be syndicated nationally by ABC Radio Networks.

Elder is a self-described social liberal and fiscal conservative who favors abortion rights and legalizing drugs.

PLACEMENT TIPS

National Geographic World, a 27-year-old magazine for children, which has been renamed National Geographic Kids, went on sale last week.

The magazine, with its core audience of 8- to 14-year-olds, is a general interest magazine, covering science, technology, current events, entertainment, culture and animals.

Editor Melina Bellow is located at the National Geographic Society, 1145 17th st., N.W., Washington, DC 20036.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is bringing back John Rosemond's parenting advice column.

His column, which was pulled from the Sunday paper a month ago, will run in the new Saturday "Living" section, which will have a page of movie reviews for kids and things to do with children.

The newspaper said more than 300 readers demanded the return of Rosemond's column. Many of the readers who called to protest were adults who had no children, or parents of grown children, the paper said.

ABC News' weblog called "The Note" is getting more than 13,000 hits a day.

Written each morning by Mark Halperin, Elizabeth Wilner and Marc Ambinder, who are veteran news staffers in ABC's Washington, D.C., bureau, the weblog (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics) contains a roundup of the morning's political news with links to newspaper articles, tied with the team's analysis.
Since "The Note" started in January, other news organizations have started Washington weblogs, including CBS News' "Washington Wrap" (www.cbs news.com) and a weblog by Chris Matthews (www.msnbc.com).

U.S. News & World Report's "Washington Whispers" column has been online for over a year (www.usnews.com).

Congressional Quarterly has introduced a new online product, CQ HomelandSecurity. A team of CQ reporters and editors will provide up-to-the- minute news and analysis on the latest homeland security spending and policy issues.

Jeff Stein is editor.

(Media news continued on next page)

PR PRO GIVES DO-IT-YOURSELF ADVICE

Joanne Cole, president of Cole Communications & PR Marketing in New York, tells small business owners how to do their own PR in a column, called "The Flak," which appears on Fortune Small Business magazine's website.

Cole bases most of her advice on her own experiences and campaigns handled by her firm, whose clients have included Ann Taylor, Chanel, Black & Decker, and Natural Resources Defense Council.

Cole, who has been a publicist for 20 years, wrotein her Aug. 14 column-headlined "Fire Your PR Firm"- that hiring a publicist is not essential.

"Although many companies invest thousands of dollars in hiring publicity firms to help them write media announcements, many of these costly missives turn out to be duds.

"They fail because they don't tell a compelling, newsworthy story that whets a journalist's interest. They don't offer fresh or timely information. And they don't target their message to the journalist's audience," said Cole, who offers tips for creating press releases, using mostly examples of releases written by her firm.

In her May 21 column, Cole offered a step-by-step guide to winning national publicity, based on her work for a pro-marijuana ad campaign in The New York Times, which was sponsored by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML).

The full-page ad quoted New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg as saying he had tried pot and liked it.

Cole said the "techniques my company used in the campaign would work well for almost any type of publicity blitz for a small business owner."

PR PRO SYNDICATES MIDDLE EAST COLUMN

Ray Hanania, who doesn't want it known that he is VP/PA at KemperLesnik Comms., Chicago, recently began a weekly column about the Middle East for The Daily Herald in Arlington Heights, Ill.

Hanania, a Palestinian American, is afraid people will think he has a PR agenda.

The PR pro, who is self-syndicating the column, believes newspapers running only pro-Israel commentary are "somewhat disrespectful to readers. They're saying, 'We know what's good for you.' A newspaper should present a good balance and let you make up your mind."

For his Sept. 11-week column, he plans to write about some of the 14 innocent Americans-of Arab descent or "Middle Eastern" appearance-killed in the U.S. in post-9/11 hate crimes.

Before joining KemperLesnik, Hanania ran his own PR firm, Urban Strategies Group Comms., and was a political writer for .

He is author of a humorous book, entitled "I'm Glad I Look Like a Terrorist," which was published in 1996.

BYRON JOINS GAMENOW AS TOP EDITOR

Tom Byron, who is the new editor-in-chief of GameNow magazine, said video game players want a magazine that gives them the "straight, no-hype story on the latest and greatest in gaming."

He said GameNow, which is published by Ziff Davis Media, will deliver previews and reviews of the hottest games and the most accurate tips, strategies, hints and tricks in the business.

GameNow's target audience, said Byron, is the more than 12 million electronic gamers who are 14 years old or younger.

Byron, who was director of product marketing at LucasArts Entertainment, is a former editor of Start magazine for Atari players, and the games editor for PC Home Journal.

MEDIA BRIEFS

Former president Bill Clinton, who has talked to NBC and CBS about hosting a TV talk show, ruled it out on Sept. 3 in an interview with CNN's Larry King.

Tina Brown, former editor of the now-defunct Talk magazine, will write a weekly column about the U.S. for The London Times.

Grace Magazine, a lifestyle magazine for full-figured women, will not carry weight-loss or tobacco ads in print or on its website.

The Weirton (WV) Daily Times began publishing a Sunday edition Sept. 8, that will emphasize local news & features, said managing editor Richard Crofton.

The International Herald Tribune plans to include a new section in its Asian editions with financial stories provided by Bloomberg News.

The new four-page section, focusing on Asian companies and Asian financial news, will appear Mondays through Fridays as of mid-October.

Rolling Stone will start a French edition next month, filled with a mix of French entertainment news and articles from the U.S. edition.

FDAnews, in Falls Church, Va., is starting Drug Industry Daily, an electronic daily briefing that provides coverage of what's happening on Capitol Hill, in the courts and at the FDA, the FTC, HHS, NIH and other key agencies and decision-making bodies that affect the pharmaceutical industry.

European Tech Wire has launched a free daily e-mail newsletter that summarizes the top technology, venture capital, and Internet stories in Europe.

With offices in London and Washington, D.C., ETW is a service of CapWire Inc., which publishes Potomac Tech Wire, an e-mail newsletter with more than 30,000 subscribers.

Stephen Johnson, editor of ETW, is based in London. www.europeantechwire.com.

ATTACK ON USS LIBERTY DEBATED

"The Liberty Incident," by A. Jay Cristol, federal judge and former naval aviator, contends that the 1967 attack by Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats on the USS Liberty off the coast of the Sinai Peninsula was a "tragic mistake" caused by numerous factors including miscommunication by both sides.

A furious debate has ensued since the book was published in June by Brassey's Military. C-Span devoted a half-hour to the controversy Aug. 22 and The History Channel aired a program on it three times. WOR Radio in New York aired a program on Aug. 28. BBC (U.K.) also ran a program on it.

Adding to the focus on the incident is the fact that this year is its 35th anniversary.

The book (www.thelibertyincident.com) is a counterpart to "Body of Secrets" (Anchor Books) authored last year by intelligence specialist James Bamford, who said he had new evidence that Israeli pilots knew they were attacking a U.S. ship.

He wrote that a U.S. intelligence aircraft, flying overhead, electronically recorded the attack including comments by the Israeli airmen.

Each side labels the other "absurd" in a debate that has grown increasingly heated.

7 Presidents Accept "Mistake" Theory

One reviewer said that Judge Cristol, who serves in the southern district of Florida, examined "ten official U.S. investigations" of the incident that indicate the attack was the result of a series of blunders by both the U.S. and Israel. He noted that seven presidents (Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush and Clinton) accepted that conclusion.

Another reviewer of the Cristol book said the attack took place during a chaotic operational environment that included the start of the 1967 war between Israel and several of its neighbors.

Eric Margolis of the Toronto Sun, in an article found via www.thehistorychannel.com, theorized that the Liberty learned Israel was planning a "Pearl Harbor-style attack" on the air forces of three Arab neighbors that had yet to make any military moves against it. This "contradicted" Israel's claim of being attacked, he said. Israel had long wanted to annex the West Bank, Jerusalem, Golan and Sinai, he wrote.

The attack, which lasted about two hours, killed 34 seamen and wounded 137 others in the crew of 297.

President Johnson, who initially went on TV and said ten sailors had been killed in a "six-minute accidental" attack, accepted an apology from Israel that labeled the incident a "tragic error." Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Joint Chiefs of Staff head Admiral Thomas Moorer called the attack deliberate.
The Liberty website contends there has "never been a congressional investigation" of the incident (www.ussliberty.com).

ABC PULLS PR HOAX ON GMA

ABC's entertainment division hired a youth marketing firm which planted actors posed as high school hockey players from a fictional town in the audience of its "Good Morning America" program to promote an upcoming drama show.

ABC tapped Los Angeles-based Attention Deficit Disorder Marketing for the project. "We have a very different show in 'Push, Nevada' and we've decided to market it in a different fashion," the network told The Washington Post.

GMA weatherman Tony Perkins, flanked by "members" of the Push, Nev., high school hockey team, held up a jersey from the fictional town, which happens to be the name of a new ABC drama set for a fall debut.

Perkins talked about the team on air ("Last year they went 12-and-1) declaring "I love Push, Nevada!" before moving on to a weather report.

ABC said neither its entertainment unit nor its news division knew of the promotion.

Via its website, ADD touts marketing which "gets under and reaches deep into the core of today's youth psyche."

Variety, which first reported the GMA promotion, received a press release from a fictitious Chamber of Commerce and Visitors Bureau in Push, Nev., claiming that local business was booming since the producers of ABC started filming there, reports the Post. Variety said hitchhikers have been spotted around Los Angeles carrying signs which read "Push, Nevada, or Bust."

ADD has worked for Nike Soccer, Premier Snowskate*, Vespa and the "Blair Witch Project."

GC PROMOTES U.S. HISTORY

Global Communicators is promoting the National Endowment of the Humanities soon-to-be launched We the People" initiative to educate Americans aboutU.S. history and this country's role in the world.

Jim Harff, CEO of GC, said the program will provide grants to scholars to explore themes and significant events in this country's history. An annual lecture series called "Heroes of History" and a web-based essay contest for young people focused on the "Idea of America" are also on tap.

Bruce Cole, former Distinguished Professor of Fine Arts and Professor of Comparative Literature at Indiana University, chairs the NEH, which is a U.S. Government entity.

IAN NAMED TO MEMBERSHIP POST AT PRSA

Jennifer Ian, marketing and membership director for the New York Society of Security Analysts, was named member services director for PR Society of America. Ian, who is charged with supervising a staff of 10 and overseeing development and marketing of membership to the organization, reports to executive director and COO Catherine Bolton.

Ian handled marketing, membership development and retention for the 8,500-member NYSSA. Prior to that, she was marketing director and senior research consultant at KPMG during a 15 year tenure.

PRSA, in an August intra-year report, reported a two percent dip in membership.

On this anniversary of the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that astounded the U.S. and the rest of the world, we are pausing from our usual concerns with PR to acknowledge the vast amount of suffering that event produced and the real possibility of more suffering ahead.

Americans now realize that the days of reading about bloodshed in far distant countries because of one conflict or another are over. The frontlines are right here and it behooves all of us to be as knowledgeable as possible about the causes of these conflicts and their possible resolution.

We hear about the 3,000 people who lost their lives on 9/11 but we believe the figure is higher because families of the undocumented didn't want to come forward and in any case lacked the necessary papers.

We hear little about the 14,000+ who were wounded in the attack or the 10,000+ small businesses in and around the Trade Center that vanished because of it.

Americans are skeptical about many of the things surrounding the attack,especially the failure of our huge intelligence community to find out about it.

A story recently on the O'Dwyer website about a seminar expressing this skepticism turned out to be the No. 1 accessed story of the month. There is a tremendous thirst for more facts.

Americans want to be patriotic in this time of unprecedented assault on our homeland. But issues are debated openly in a democracy and debates are won by those with the most facts. The Internet, with its input from media worldwide, provides access to numerous schools of thought here and abroad.

The U.S. does not want to fight the entire Muslim world but our PR efforts aimed at this world by ad executive Charlotte Beers have been a giant flop so far. This is a job for PR, not advertising. Editorial-level details and thoroughness are needed, not superficial ad slogans.

The New Yorker, again tackling a business issue many business publications avoid, did a positive profile of securities litigator Bill Lerach.

Lerach in 1995 was portrayed as evil incarnate by the accounting industry, Fortune (which called him an "economic terrorist"), Forbes, and other business publications. Supposedly, his "frivolous" lawsuits caused budding entrepreneurs endless grief. All a stock had to do was drop a few points and Lerach and his goons would drag them into court and cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The accounting industry, National IR Institute and other business groups in 1996 got the "Safe Harbor" act (Private Securities Litigation Reform Act) passed which was supposed to usher in "a new era of openness in corporate communications to investors," as IR veteran Ted Pincus put it.

The opposite happened. Corporate fraud took place on an unprecedented scale. IR people and their bossesflooded the financial and general press with misleading if not downright false "pro forma" earnings statements. Company financial reports, wrested from PR pros by ex-analysts who jumped into IR, became a swampland of obfuscation and remain that way.

This corruption has led to a lack of faith in accounting firms and the stock market and raised doubts about the U.S. economic system itself. The PSLRA was supposed to protect accounting firms but the demise of Arthur Andersen is proof that it didn't. Bill Lerach is riding high again.

Lerach, responding in 1996 to charges that a "deluge" of stockholder suits was being launched, said less than 1% of companies were ever sued and only those whose principals sold stock just before it dropped. The PSLRA was passed over the veto of President Clinton and the opposition of 150 newspapers and numerous state pension funds.

USA Today said the new law would "open the door to fraud."

Fortune ran what Jeffrey Toobin, author of the New Yorker article, refers to as a "9,000-word professional obituary" of Lerach.

Lerach told Toobin there is "so much fraud" and "so little time."

The New Yorker article does not mention the Omnicom and Interpublic lawsuits. Milberg Weiss is seeking to be the lead firm in those cases but the lead firm has yet to be chosen. One charge in the suit vs. IPG is that 17 executives sold $100 million of stock at prices inflated by erroneous earnings reports. Nine Omnicom executives sold stock worth $72 million.

Chan Suh, one of the founders of Agency.com, in which OMC once had a 36% interest, told the New York Times Sept. 7 that his "80 employees" did not have to work Sept. 11 because it should be a "day of reflection."

ACOM once had nearly 2,000 employees. It had 1,080 staffers in May 2001 (after making the latest cut of 350) when Suh and others sold their shares to Seneca Investments, formed by OMC and Pegasus Partners II.

This gave Seneca a 65.7% stake. OMC has claimed that the Seneca deal was done in the open but Advertising Age complained 5/21/01 that OMC, ACOM, Pegasus and three other entities refused to answer any of its questions about the deal.

ACOM lost $10.3M in Q1 of 2001. About 16 dot-coms were off-loaded by OMC into Seneca. Their stock value, once worth $3 billion, had become essentially worthless as prices plunged to the $1 and $2 range and below that.
--Jack O'Dwyer