Omnicom Group, Inc. OMC
Q4 2011 Earnings Call Transcript

Operator: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Omnicom Fourth Quarter 2011 Earnings Release Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions will follow at that time. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded.

At this time, I'd like to now introduce you to today's conference call host, Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer of Omnicom Group, Mr. Randall Weisenburger. Please go ahead.

Randall J. Weisenburger - EVP and CFO: Good morning. Thank you for taking the time to listen to our fourth quarter 2011 earnings call. We hope everyone has had a chance to review our earnings release. We've posted to our website both the press release and a presentation covering the information that we'll be presenting this morning. This call is also being simulcast and will be archived on our website.

But before we start, I've been asked to remind everyone to read the forward-looking statements and other information that's included on Page 1 of our investor presentation and to point out that certain of the statements made today may constitute forward-looking statements and that these statements are our present expectations and actual events or results may differ materially.

I'd also like to remind you that during the course of the call we will discuss some non-GAAP measures in talking about Omnicom's performance. You can find a reconciliation of those measures to the nearest comparable GAAP measures in the presentation materials.

We're going to begin the call with some brief remarks from John Wren. Then following John's remarks, we'll review our financial information for the quarter and then both John and I will be happy to take questions.

John D. Wren - President and CEO: Good morning. I'm pleased to speak with you this morning about our latest business results, the progress we made 2011 against our key strategic initiatives and my thoughts for 2012.

Thanks to an exception list of clients and the commitment, talent and creativity of our people, we have generated very strong results throughout 2011 and we end the year extremely well-positioned for future growth. We recognize that global economy is operating at three speeds. As the European downturn continues to unfold, its impact for now is limited to Europe. Despite these problems, we continue to see significant opportunities for growth.

Amidst the uncertainty, we continue to focus on the things we at Omnicom can control.

First, let me speak about the fourth quarter and 2011. Organic growth in the fourth quarter was up 5.2%. This reflected strong performance even in the face of difficult year-over-year comps. Our fourth quarter was driven by strong results across both disciplines and markets with the notable exception of Euro markets where growth was negative for the quarter. For the full year, organic growth was 6.1%. In the quarter, we continued expand our presence in key emerging markets. We announced the acquisition of a majority stake in Mudra Group, one of India's leading integrating marketing communication companies, and we completed transactions in Turkey and South Africa. These transactions help us build our capabilities and expand our base of talent in these key markets.