Publicis buys last 25% of Zenith

FRENCH advertising giant Publicis today confirmed it had bought the remaining 25% of ZenithOptimedia from WPP for £75m.

The deal means Publicis boss Maurice Levy has been thwarted in his attempt to buy assets on the cheap from the troubled Cordiant group, the ailing ad firm which was recently purchased by WPP. He had earlier agreed on a much lower price for ZenithOptimedia, Cordiant's media-buying arm.

Publicis already owns 75% of ZenithOptimedia and found itself contractually obliged to buy the minority stake. The £75m it has paid comes on top of a further £10m bill for other assets with the Zenith name attached.

Publicis, the world's fourth biggest advertising and marketing firm, said in a statement that the purchase price for the ZenithOptimedia stake was in line with the terms of its original joint venture agreement with Cordiant.

Cordiant has been at the centre of an extraordinarily complicated takeover battle. Sir Martin Sorrell's WPP group won control of Cordiant in July with a £266m debt and equity offer.

Even before WPP launched its offer for Cordiant, Levy approached Sorrell with a suggestion that he could buy the minority stake in ZenithOptimedia for only £63.75m as well as the £10m for other parts of the business that he wanted.

The lower price tag had previously been agreed with Cordiant chief executive David Hearn who had asked Levy to buy out ZenithOptimedia earlier than the original deadline of January next year.