BT Group CPO Hari Sundaresan to speak on how procurement impacts media spend at FEPE Congress

Hari Sundaresan, Chief Procurement Officer of BT Group, one of Britain's biggest companies and advertisers, will deliver a keynote at this year's FEPE International Congress in Sorrento, Italy on June 6-8, looking at the growing role and importance of procurement as a strategic sourcing function within BT and how this flows down into managing significant spend across media.
All the world's major advertisers are trying to rein in marketing expenditure in a low interest rate, cost-conscious and return on investment (ROI) environment and Sundaresan, one of the UK's most senior executives in the sector, is well placed to describe how these factors relate to Out of Home and its growth prospects.

New Postercope Global President, Stephen Whyte will make one of his first appearances in this role on a major public platform at FEPE as he joins a panel discussing the Out of Home industry's Value Proposition. Whyte, a former CEO of ad agency McCann-Erickson in the UK who also ran his own successful digital business consultancy, is an expert on how digital is transforming the advertising business.

Delegates will also hear from financial expert Mark Boidman, Managing Director, Head of Media Services, Media and Tech Investment Banking at New York banking advisory firm PJ SOLOMON who will update Congress on a busy mergers and acquisitions market. Boidman has worked on over $40bn of deals in the sector.

They will join a distinguished line-up of already named speakers from the across the world including World Federation of Advertisers President and RBS Chief Marketing Officer David Wheldon, Brendon Cook, CEO of Australia’s Ooh! Media and Eric Newnham, Co-founder and CEO of the UK’s Talon Outdoor, a new force in Out of Home planning and buying which has recently expanded to the United States. Newnham is a former CEO of WPP’s Kinetic.

FEPE President Tom Goddard says: “This is the strongest ever line-up at a FEPE conference. I am also very excited about the composition and balance of this year’s programme, which promises to deliver valuable take-home value for all attendees. With registrations running at a record level, networking opportunities will be greater than ever, which undoubtedly means that Sorrento is the place to be for all senior OOH stakeholders this year.”

For further information: contact Richard Saturley richard@fepe.com

About FEPE International

FEPE International (established in 1959) is the only global Out of Home Association, working to promote and improve the OOH industry on behalf of our members. Board members include the major International companies  - JCDecaux, Clear Channel and Exterion - as well as Ströer, Pikasso, and more recently blowUP media, OUTFRONT Media from the US, oOh!Media from Australia and Selvel One from India.
Membership is open to all companies who operate in the OOH sector and as a non-profit Federation funds are reinvested in industry issues such as research and the annual international congress. FEPE is a member of EASA and ESOMAR in Europe as well as a founding member of ICAS and also actively works to help the membership with legislation issues within their own countries as well. It also aims to lobby for Out of Home advertising with authorities, international organizations, opinion formers and other elements of the communication media. More information is available at www.fepe.com