PARIS, July 28 (Reuters) - The head of French advertisingagency Havas on Sunday questioned the logic of aplanned merger between larger global rivals Publicis and Omnicom, saying it was not in the best interests ofclients or staff.
The world's second- and third-largest ad groups are expectedto unveil a plan to merge to overtake current leader WPP, a source familiar with the situation has said. Publicishas called a news conference for 1200 GMT on Sunday.
"I'm not sure this is in the best interests of their clientsor their talent," Havas chief executive David Jones said in astatement. "Clients today want us to be faster, more agile, morenimble and more entrepreneurial, not bigger and morebureaucratic and more complex."
Publicis and Omnicom have so far not commented on whetherthey do intend to merge and what the rationale would be. Thecombined group would have a market capitalisation of around $30billion and annual sales of around $23 billion.
The deal would reshape the advertising industry's bigplayers when the growth of internet marketing is leading torapid changes in how companies sell products and control theirimage.
"It's a massively interesting and surprising move," Jonessaid. "The industry's obsession with mergers and acquisitionsstill amazes me particularly in a world where digital andtechnology have made scale irrelevant."
The CEO pointed to Instagram and Facebook as examplesof companies that operate with slim staffing but have vastnumbers of clients.
"Our business is very simple - it's about clients andtalented employees - and as I said, I'm not sure this move isgood for either of them," Havas' Jones said.
Havas has a market capitalisation of around 2.1 billioneuros ($2.79 billion) and sales in 2012 were 1.8 billion euros.
Omnicom had a market capitalisation of $16.8 billion at theclose of trading on Friday, while Publicis was valued at 12.5billion euros.
Publicis CEO Maurice Levy has turned Publicis into a globalforce during his 26 year tenure largely through savvydeal-making and a prescient push into internet and digitalmarketing.