WPP-Scangroup is a subsidiary of WPP and is listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange. It is the largest marketing and communication group operating a multi-agency model across multiple disciplines in Sub-Saharan Africa. The group comprises the ad agencies Ogilvy Africa, SCANAD, JWT and BluePrint Marketing; media firms GroupM, MediaCom Africa, Mindshare and MEC; public relations agencies Ogilvy PR (a part of Ogilvy Africa) and H+K Strategies; market research agency Millward Brown; specialty communication firms Roundtrip and Geometry Global; and digital companies OgilvyOne, Squad Digital and SCANAD Digital. In all, over 1200 people are employed across the various organizations.
Scangroup Limited was incorporated in Kenya as a private limited liability company on 26 January 1999 under the name Media Initiative East Africa Limited. In October 2005 the company changed its name to Scangroup Limited. Scangroup listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange on 29 August 2006 and is currently the only marketing services company listed on the exchange. In late 2013 Scangroup became a subsidiary of WPP and subsequently the company renamed itself to WPP-Scangroup Limited on 15 June 2015.
Ownership
Since 2006, the company stock is listed on the Nairobi Stock Exchange, where it trades under the symbol:SCAN. Its largest shareholder is the WPP Group, controlling 50.10% of the issued share capital of Scangroup though its subsidiaries Cavendish Square Holding BV and Ogilvy South Africa.[2] As of May 2014[update], the ten largest investors in the company were:[3]