WPP launches KPO unit

The $9 billion global advertising giant WPP and its media buying wing, Group M India (formerly WPP India), launched their data analytics knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) entity, Meritus, today. V Balasubramanium will head the outfit.

The wholly-owned WPP entity partners with Covansys India "� arm of Michigan-based IT firm Covansys Corporation. Though a partner, Covansys India will not be a board member, it will only provide the technical support and expertise required.

"Unlike companies like Accenture that are only into consulting, Meritus will go beyond consulting to implementation," says Nick Emery, chief strategy officer, Group M.

He confirmed that the KPO is not a test but a global operation headquartered in India. Meritus will operate out of its data analytics centre at Covansys' premises in Bangalore. The KPO is expected to start operations on January 2, 2006.

Meritus is an extension of Group M's two-year-old KPO, Global Analytical Centre (GAC), based in Bangalore. The unit accounts for about 10 per cent of Group M's total business in India. A lot of data analytics done by Group M's outfit Advanced Technique Group (ATG), were being outsourced to the back-end unit in Bangalore.

The outfit earlier had about 20 people and worked on 60 projects last year, one-third of which were India-centric, while the remaining two-thirds were mostly for Europe and Australia.