Havas Creative, formerly known as Havas Worldwide and Euro RSCG, is a French advertising agency. It is one of the largest integrated marketing communications agencies in the world, made up of 316 offices located in 75 countries. The firm provides advertising, marketing, and corporate communications services. In 2010, Advertising Age listed the firm,, as having more global assignments than any other network for the fifth consecutive year, making the agency the world's largest network by global accounts. Headquartered in New York, Havas Worldwide is the largest unit of Havas, the fifth largest communications group in the world, behind Omnicom, WPP, Interpublic, and Publicis.
Corporate history
In 1970 Bernard Roux and Jacques Séguéla established an agency called Roux Séguéla. In 1972, Alain Cayzac joined Roux Séguéla, and the company became Roux Séguéla Cayzac. In 1975 Havas Conseil reconstituted as a Eurocom holding company. In 1976 Roux Séguéla Cayzac merged with Jean-Michel Goudard to form RSCG; each letter in RSCG corresponds to the name of each of their founders: Roux, Séguela, Cayzac, and Goudard. In 1991 Eurocom S.A. acquired RSCG to form Euro RSCG. In 1997 Euro RSCG Worldwide moved its headquarters from Paris to New York; American executive Bob Schmetterer was named Chairman and CEO. In 2001, the company acquired a minority stake in UK financial public relations firm, The Maitland Consultancy. In 2012 the firm, having by then been acquired by Paris, France-based advertising and public relations company Havas, was rebranded as Havas Worldwide.
Leadership
In 2014, Havas Group Chairman Yannick Bolloré also became Global CEO of Havas, and Andrew Benett was named Global CEO of Havas Worldwide. Previous CEO David Jones was named CEO of the firm, then named Euro RSCG Worldwide, in 2005. He also became Global CEO of parent company Havas in 2011. Mercedes Erra is the executive president of Havas Worldwide, and credited with the company's Evian campaign "Roller Babies," which made headlines and a mention in the Guinness Book of World Records for receiving over 75 million views.
In July 2019 the firm created an advertisement for a Singaporean media company. In the ad, Mediacorp actor and deejay Dennis Chew, who is Chinese, appeared in "brownface" - the act of darkening one's fair skin to mimic that of another race - as an Indian character and as a Malay woman wearing a headscarf. The ad sparked backlash online and Havas worldwide apologized subsequently.
