Back to Newsroom
Back to Newsroom

UCP Monthly Shareholders Newsletter: November 2014

Sunday, 23 November 2014 06:05 PM

United Communications Partners

Topic:

United Communications Partners, Sunday, November 23, 2014, Press release picture

Monthly Shareholder’s Newsletter

Issue 11: November 2014                              

We welcome our investors from around the world once again to the November issue of the UCP Newsletter. In it you will find the information you need as reported by the management of the various companies that fall under our holding company umbrella.

As we approach the end of the year, we thank the shareholders once again for their emails and continued UCP support. We look forward to an even bigger and brighter 2015, together! ……Ken

UCP News:

The Annual Shareholder’s Meeting was held in Stockholm, Sweden at UCP’s headquarters on October 31st. We are proud to announce that after shareholder voting results from around the world were tabulated, the current board of directors was voted in for another year. The UCP BOD that was voted in with an overwhelming mandate to grow the business for 2015 are:

 

United Communications Partners, Sunday, November 23, 2014, Press release picture 

In addition, our top shareholders took part in the annual meeting by calling in and asking pertinent questions to the board members. Ideas such as ways to add new investors and bolster the UCP share price were brought up. We heard you and we are listening. Therefore, UCP plans on having one more board meeting this year, in December. Among many issues on the table will be global business development, growth for 2015 and a discussion with regards to the shareholder’s recommendations.

As to UCP’s 3rd Quarter Results, our CFO Anna-Karin Darlin delivered the numbers this past Saturday, November 15th, via our corporate website. She had this to say about them:

"The UCP Inc. Q3RF report for 2014 shows that the Group has doubled the net revenues the nine months ended September compared to last year. Client’s media investments in third quarter decreased compared to the second quarter 2014, and even if it at the moment looks as the media spend improves in the last quarters they are not as high as expected. Still the aggregated media spend for all companies in the group has increases by 4.7% (+3.3 MUSD) compared to the same period last year. The Group’s result also improved – 29% - compared with the same period last year. Unfortunately the bottom line is still showing a loss.

The ongoing development projects aiming to ensure the Group fulfils its objective to provide high level effective communication services to clients in the increasingly complex communication arena, and the extensive sales processes in 2014 has required resources both in terms of time and money, and for 2014 we have reluctantly had to conclude that the Group will not be able to reach break-even for the full year. This said we forecast the result to be significantly improved compare to last year. We are convinced that the work done this year has laid the foundation for the future, enabling us to fulfil the overall objectives and to continue to improve profitability in the future."

In sum, we look forward to the continued guidance and contributions from our Board members and to the progress and future success of UCP in 2015 and beyond.

________________________________________________________________________________________

3Kronor Stockholm

As conveyed to me by the office’s CEO Mia Forsgren, the positive business energy continues at 3Kronor Stockholm. In fact, it is growing.

October has been a busy period once again, full of meetings with potential new clients. We foresee many new opportunities for 2015. In just one week, 3Kronor met with top possible clients Stor & Liten (e-commerce for toys), The Swedish Royal Opera, and a start-up called Glue! 

At the moment we are focusing on closing 2014 in the best way.  And of course, continuing the growth momentum into 2015.

New clients are: Destination Järvsö, a Swedish ski resort- (planning for winter season), a marketing campaign from Eniro (Swedish search engine) and a lot of new assignments by our already existing clients.

 

United Communications Partners, Sunday, November 23, 2014, Press release picture
In further news, the Stockholm office has collectively just finished step 2 "Inspire Shared Visions" in our education program:" 7-step Sustainability Change Process", our focus on how one can one optimize and derive increased value from change management efforts. As such, on November 13th, everyone (100% of the employees) at 3Kronor took the Google Search exam (AdWords fundamental).

 

 

United Communications Partners, Sunday, November 23, 2014, Press release picture
 

 

On Nov 11-12 there was an important seminar (SIME) in Stockholm, where we were proud to present one of our clients (Urb-it) as a speaker, as businesses from around the world gathered to explore new business opportunities.

United Communications Partners, Sunday, November 23, 2014, Press release picture    United Communications Partners, Sunday, November 23, 2014, Press release picture

In the recent edition of Sweden’s Dagen’s Media, our own Maya Garkusha wrote the following (translated here in English, with the original article in Swedish found in the link below):

"Programmatic or RTB as it was called in the earlier days, has been a trending high in recent years. It is a revolutionary way to buy media that is more transparent, more efficient, more flexible and above all, more intelligent.

Most have read of reports showing the rapid growth of programmatic and many industry players are positioned with both staff and technology to enable a transition to programmatic buying.

However, there is one thing that inhibits development: payment models from the technology suppliers. Today, buyers pay a percentage charge on media investment that varies depending on the technology used.

Many turn a blind eye, however, when people start buying "premium space” which traditionally have been at least as high of a CPM as a regular booked campaign.

For technology providers, cost transactions of a hundred million views are just as important regardless of the CPM (price screenings sold for). But it will be a very big difference for buyers if we buy impressions for CPM 10 CPM or 100 as a percentage of cost involved.

In practice this means that, for high CPM rates, it will be more expensive to shop via programmatic than to call a seller and complete the purchase manually.

The merit of the technology providers will also be ridiculously high when the revenue can go up a hundred times without a number of views increases. It is clear that the payment model is based on an outdated scenario where it is not possible to perform premium buying via programmatic.

Now that reality has changed should technology provider’s payment models follow suit, too? If the solution had been a self- built platform then agencies may not need to worry; but unfortunately it does not solve all problems.

It is possible to argue that agencies that used similar payment models for traditional media buying are part of the same problem. The difference is that on the agency side, revenue models already begun to change as customers placed other requirements. Now we have to make the same demands on technology suppliers.

Our customers are ready and publishers await. As we observe, we have started buying premium format via programmatic – so as not to get caught up in the race to the bottom via rhetoric. My question is, what will technology providers do to take the next step in evolution?"

Maya Garkusha, Head of Programmatic Tre Kronor

http://www.dagensmedia.se/nyheter/dig/article3864600.ece

Maya’s words were also picked up by the website idg, which is considered the “front page” for the largest IT networks, giving readers access to IDG’s IT publications:

http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.598007/sverige-halkar-efter-inom-digital-annonsering

Finally, 3Kronor Stockholm, along with agency partner Columbus Media International, under Horizon Media New York stewardship, reports that Readly is:

  • Expanding their business into Germany with the help of the German agency MediaPlus.
    In Sweden, 3Kronor has produced a TV Commercial for Readly, with great response and interest from the consumer

_________________________________________________________________________________________
 

3Kronor Copenhagen

3Kronor Copenhagen is currently working with a potential client: Coloplast. Coloplast is a Danish multinational company that develops, manufactures and markets medical devices and services related to ostomy, urology, continence, and wound care. They have asked 3Kronor to explore the possibilities of market theming in the US.

 

__________________________________________________________________________________________

HowCom/HowCom Evolution - Sweden

In the past month, no new employees were hired. But, that did not stop us from winning new business.

Client Wins

Transportstyrelsen (Swedish Transport Agency) The Swedish Transport Agency have greatly increased their market investments. HowCom is responsible for planning and buying four campaigns for the opening of Norra Länken, the new tunnel in Stockholm, Congestion Tax in Göteborg and Bridge-tolls in Sundsvall and Motala.


Client News

SevenDay Finans specializes in savings accounts and personal loans in Sweden. This client will be launching new products in the Swedish market shortly. HowCom will plan and buy radio and digital media for the campaign period.

General

Continued interest in digital media from our clients for 2015. The situation on the Swedish TV market also drives the client into the digital platforms. 

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Native Clicks – Spain 

The hard at work team over at Native Clicks reports in that in the past month, there was no client wins/losses and no new employees.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

In Sight - Norway

The hard at work team over at In Sight reports in that in the past month, there was no client wins/losses and no new employees.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

About United Communications Partners

United Communications Partners is a communication holding group with award winning subsidiaries and operational focus in Europe and North America. For more information please visit our website: http://www.ucpworld.com/ or find us on the OTC Market Wire News as well as iHub, news wire gateway to Reuters, DowJones, Bloomberg, Yahoo Finance, WSJ and many more news reporting services.

Questions/Comments:

United Communications Partners

291 Broadway, Suite 302

New York, NY 10007

email: [email protected]

 

 

Source: UCP Inc.

 
Topic:
Back to newsroom
Back to Newsroom
Share by: