Alexander Haldemann becomes CEO of Publicis Groupe

Just this spring, he was promoted to international chairman of MetaDesign, a branding agency belonging to Publicis. Now comes the next step in Alexander Haldemann's career: He will become CEO of Publicis Groupe Zurich, according to a media release published on Thursday afternoon. The current CEO, Thomas Wildberger, is stepping down from his post.

Haldemann's promotion is linked to an organizational realignment, according to the media release: Publicis Groupe in Zurich "is gearing its organization to integrate its service offering even more closely in the interests of its clients and to ensure even closer and more flexible cooperation between the individual agencies. To this end, it is bringing together the communications, digital and media agencies and the branding agency MetaDesign. All will be managed by a new overarching organization in the future. Overall responsibility will be assumed by Alexander Haldemann as CEO. He will thus also become Chairman of the Group Executive Board, consisting of the current members Peter van der Touw (COO Publicis Communications), Dirk Lux (CEO Publicis Media), Lukas Eiselin (CEO MetaDesign) and Edgar Magyar (CFO Publicis Groupe Zurich)."

In the course of the reorganization, Thomas Wildberger, the previous CEO of Publicis Communications, had announced his resignation from this position. Thomas Wildberger had led Publicis Communications since 2012 - first as Chief Creative Officer, later as CEO of the communications agencies. Discussions are currently taking place with Wildberger "to shape further cooperation."

Alexander Haldemann studied at the University of St. Gallen (HSG) and earned his doctorate in economics from the University of Zurich. He has worked in the creative industry for over 20 years and has owned the branding agency MetaDesign in Switzerland and the USA. In 2016, he sold his company to Publicis Groupe and, as CEO, was responsible for its integration into the global communications network. In June, he relinquished operational leadership of the agency and assumed the newly created position of global chairman MetaDesign. He will continue in this role.

The new Publicis CEO has been dealing with the attitude of brands for quite some time - one of his heartfelt topics. To this end, he gave werbewoche.ch a detailed interview in Maywhich also allows conclusions to be drawn about possible future decisions within Publicis Groupe. Haldemann himself says of his new role: "Publicis Groupe has been shaping the Swiss communications landscape for 70 years - and that is also the aspiration for the future. Thomas Wildberger has built a team of exceptional creativity. That deserves respect and we will build on it. Our goal now must be to position the individual agencies clearly in the market with their different competencies, while at the same time playing to our advantage when working together. I look forward to tackling this challenge with my colleagues."