M&C Saatchi has rejected a £50million bid for one of its business units from a deal-hungry marketing rival backed by Rupert Murdoch and Tory peer Lord Ashcroft.
Brave Bison, which has bought up five businesses already this year, on Monday confirmed it had made a non-binding proposal to acquire M+C Saatchi Performance.
The unit is responsible for media planning and buying across digital channels, a key growth area in the marketing sector. It generated the bulk of the £26.8million in revenues produced by M&C Saatchi’s media division last year.
M&C Performance’s clients include US tech giants Amazon and Meta, according to Sky News, which originally reported the approach on Sunday.
London-listed Brave Bison is run by brothers Oliver and Theo Green, who serve as executive chairman and chief growth officer respectively.
It runs the Social Chain agency started by Dragons’ Den star Steven Bartlett.
M&C Saatchi said the offer ‘fundamentally undervalues’ its Performance unit
Murdoch’s News Corporation took a stake in the marketing firm earlier this year through a combination of its influencer marketing divisions.
Brave Bison said it wants to merge M&C Performance with its existing performance marketing operations to form ‘a scaled digital media challenger to the global marketing networks’.
It added: ‘The combined business would be one of the largest independent performance marketing companies outside the US, with a market-leading presence in UK and APAC with no substantial regional overlap.’
Brave Bison said it would fund the deal via a new bank facility of up to £25million, and the placing of new ordinary shares to existing and new investors.
However, M&C Saatchi rejected the bid, which it says ‘fundamentally undervalues the division and does not reflect [its] future prospects’.
It comes as shares in Britain’s major listed ad companies, M&C Saatchi and rivals WPP and S4 Capital, have fallen to multi-year lows in 2025 as the industry suffers a sharp slowdown.
Profits and revenues have come under intense pressure as clients defer spending amid an uncertain economic backdrop, and new artificial intelligence tools see a growing number of companies look to produce their own marketing.
M&C Saatchi slashed profit guidance in September, with the group highlighting Australian and British markets as coming under particular strain.
The group told shareholders on Monday: ‘The board can confirm it received an unsolicited approach for the division from Brave Bison.
‘The board is of the view that the offer fundamentally undervalues the division and does not reflect the future prospects for the division which forms a core element of the company’s growth plans; as such no discussions are ongoing.
‘The board remains focused on delivering value for the company’s shareholders.’
M&C Saatchi shares were up 4.4 per cent at 142p in early trading, having lost 30 per cent over the last 12 months.
Brave Bison shares were down 2.1 per cent at 79.3p, having doubled over the past year.
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