HP is currently in the final stages of the review, which sees McCann squaring up against the incumbent Publicis/Saatchis offering to handle regional networking and local demand-generation duties across all global markets. The review follows the departure of HP chief executive Carly Fiorina and subsequent hire of Tom Bradley as the executive VP of HP's personal systems group (PSG) in mid-2005. It is believed that Bradley is driving the review.
"Tom Bradley is new to HP, relatively speaking, but we do believe that his inclination is to put it with one global agency," said one source involved in the review. "What's interesting is that five or more years ago they consolidated a large roster of agencies down to a relatively efficient line-up of Goodby (Silverstein & Partners) and Publicis, and my guess is there are people in the procurement department who would see it as a retrograde step to unbundle this arrangement."
In an earlier phase of the review, Goodby was retained as global lead creative agency for HP's PSG.
