Ad boss Maurice Levy to linger longer at Publicis

Veteran advertising boss Maurice Levy will stay at the helm of Publicis Groupe longer than expected, until 2017, as part of a shake-up today that saw chief operating officer Jean-Yves Naouri depart after a failed £23 billion merger with US rival Omnicom.

Levy, 72, will remain as chairman and chief executive until the French advertising group reports its 2016 annual results, which suggests he will step down around March 2017, having been in the job for 30 years.

However, Levy has previously talked of retirement only to stay longer.

Naouri, Levy’s No. 2 and a one-time potential successor, is departing after reports of tension during 10 months of talks with Omnicom, which broke down in May when the two companies could not agree on which executives would take the most-senior roles in a merged group.

Among the winners in the shake-up are Arthur Sadoun, boss of subsidiary Publicis Worldwide, who is seen as a successor to Levy, and Robert Senior, who is promoted to worldwide chief executive of Saatchi & Saatchi from his London role running Europe and the Middle East.