The Association of Public Relations Agencies in Switzerland (BPRA) has been organizing a workshop in the "Agency Management" series for its member agencies twice a year for years. As part of its efforts to open up the event to other exponents of the PR industry, the BPRA is now also making it accessible to third parties, as detailed in a press release issued on Monday. On Wednesday, April 16, 2008, a short workshop on "Thinking outside the box when developing PR concepts" will take place at the Zunfthaus zur Saffran in Zurich. The workshop will be led by Jiri Scherer, partner at Denkmotor GmbH. He is the author of the creativity tool "Ideen Box - Ideen finden, bewerten und umsetzen" and winner of the "New Entrepreneurs in Technology and Science Awards". According to the press release, Scherer will show in the workshop how creativity can be learned as a thinking skill for developing PR concepts, how established thought patterns can be broken and how communication goals can be achieved more quickly.
All participants will receive documentation. The participation fee for non-members of the BPRA is CHF 250. Registrations are accepted by the BPRA office on 041 768 99 37 or info@bpra.

 
René Rindlisbacher will become the new publishing director of the Limmattaler Zeitung in Dietikon in March 2008. He succeeds Oscar Meier. The latter took over the management of Media Factory, AZ Medien's agency company, on January 1, 2008, according to a press release issued on Monday. Ernst Oertle, the former managing director of the Anzeiger from the Affoltern district, had been managing the publishing house of the Limmattaler Zeitung on an interim basis since January. René Rindlisbacher is a qualified marketing manager and was responsible for various publishing tasks at the Basellandschaftliche Zeitung in Liestal. As part of the Mittelland Zeitung partnership, he has already been involved in several publishing projects for the Aargauer Zeitung/Mittellandzeitung. Prior to this, Rindlisbacher worked for Ofa and Publicitas for several years, including as advertising manager.
The Limmattaler Zeitung is a regional daily newspaper in the Limmattal region of Zurich. It has a circulation of 10,495 copies and reaches 21,000 readers. Since September 2007, the newspaper has also been published as Sonntag LiZ. The Limmattaler Zeitung is integrated into the Mittelland Zeitung network.

 As part of a selection process, Swiss Export Risk Insurance SERV has entrusted the Zurich PR agency Open up with the mandate for ongoing communications consulting and PR support. In a first project, the agency took over the editing of the annual report. Other areas of responsibility include ongoing communications consulting, text and editorial work for various publications and the website, as well as media relations, according to the agency.
At the same time as the PR mandate, SERV tendered the mandate for the implementation of the newly defined CI/CD. This mandate was awarded to the cross-media communications agency Inform, with which Open up has a network partnership.

 The financial investor Hellman & Friedman wants to acquire Getty Images, the world's largest photo agency, for around 2.4 billion dollars. The agency's management board has approved the deal. The purchase price includes debt of up to 400 million dollars. Founded in 1995, the photo and video agency has grown rapidly through acquisitions, but is suffering from fierce competition on the image market. Its customers include advertising agencies and the media. Its biggest competitors are Jupitermedia and Microsoft founder Bill Gates' private agency Corbis. Other competitors are news agencies with their image offerings.
Getty's stock market value had almost halved in the past year. At the start of trading on Monday, Getty shares shot up by a good 31 percent to 32.10 dollars, according to SDA.

 According to a British rating, Google is the number one corporate brand. The internet giant was able to overtake competitors such as the BBC and Microsoft in the UK and is considered the strongest corporate brand according to the latest report by the independent industry organization Superbrands. Superbrands rates brands according to quality, reliability and differentiation from others. Google moved up five places compared to 2007, knocking last year's winner BBC off the top of the rankings. Second place behind Google went to Microsoft, followed by BP, BBC, GlaxoSmithKLine and Rolls-Royce. Microsoft was already in second place in the UK last year and thus remained stable. The best media brands in the top 50 are Reuters, the Financial Times and the Economist. Companies with a long tradition in the UK are particularly dominant. Among the top 50, only Google and Ebay were founded after 1990.
In contrast to the UK, Superbrands does not publish any explicit rankings in German-speaking countries, according to the press release. The 500 best brands in the ranking are selected by a committee and an independent survey of 1,500 experts. This year, Saatchi & Saatchi emerged as the best advertising agency in 50th place. The beleaguered internet giant Yahoo was relegated from 79th to 102nd place, while British Airways successfully overtook its rival Virgin Atlantic, which dropped eight places.

 
Swiss Poster Research Plus (SPR+) is now offering a free basic version of SPR+ Expert Studio for the rough planning of poster campaigns. According to a press release issued on Thursday, this is intended to provide support for the rough planning and simulation of poster campaigns, and an update has gone online for the full SPR+ Expert version: In addition to various convenience improvements, SPR+ also introduced innovations relating to contact classes, which the Research Advisory Council brought to SPR+.
SPR+ also announces that the GPS field survey has been successfully completed. The performance values reported via the poster planning tool SPR+ Expert are now based on over 2.7 million kilometers of routes. More than 10,000 test persons generated a total of over 70,000 measurement days. According to the press release, this has further strengthened the mobility model. The area data from APG, CCO and Star Plakat has been updated on this basis for all 55 Swiss conurbations.

The Zurich agency Assai is producing an invitation mailing for Chrysler Switzerland. According to a press release issued on Monday, the new products from Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge will be presented. The mailing is intended to motivate customers and interested parties to experience the new products at the motor show and is green in color, in keeping with spring. According to the agency, this tonality is intended to create a bridge to the increasing environmental awareness that is present everywhere. Chrysler is also integrating particularly environmentally friendly models into its range.
The mailing includes free tickets for the motor show. With a response element, the customer can order information material and register for a test drive.
Responsible at Chrysler Switzerland:

Claudia Meyer (Head of Marketing and Communication Chrysler, Jeep® and Dodge), Michelle Joho (Marketing Communication Chrysler, Jeep® and Dodge). Responsible at Assai: Karin Lang, Gioia Heizmann, Marlene Flück (Consulting), Stefan Dätwyler (Creative Direction). Online implementation: Netvertising AG, Oliver Johnson.

 The software giant Microsoft has rejected fears that a takeover of the Internet company Yahoo could lead to massive job cuts. There will be some overlaps, wrote Microsoft President for Platforms and Services, Kevin Johnson, in an e-mail to employees. However, Microsoft is a growth company and has hired more than 20,000 people since 2005 alone. Capable employees would be accommodated in the new group, and Yahoo's headquarters in Sunnyvale would also be retained. However, he did not commit himself to figures, but the pressure on Yahoo's management is constantly growing. Two further US pension funds have sued the company for acting against the interests of shareholders with its rejection, as reported by SDA on Monday. Another financial company already took the company to court at the beginning of the month.
More than three weeks after Microsoft's takeover bid for Yahoo, the outcome of the tug-of-war is still open. Yahoo had rejected the original offer of just under 45 billion dollars as clearly too low and is looking for alternatives. Microsoft nevertheless wants to push through the plan and thus break the dominance of arch-rival Google in online search and Internet advertising.

The Erlenbach-based agency Metzgerlehner has created a cross-media presence for Kägi Söhne. According to a press release on Monday, the campaign is based on an online game: game codes applied to every pack of Kägi hazelnuts can be used to win instant prizes or improve your own high score with a time credit. The campaign also includes an advertisement on the front page and second cover of the commuter newspaper 20 Minuten. The domain Kaegi-game.ch was also activated for the Kägi Game. This is advertised with animated banners on highly frequented news sites. The Kägi Game is also a central component of communication in the nationwide poster campaign alongside the product image of the Kägi hazelnut. In addition, promotional teams will carry out sampling in various Coop sales outlets.
Responsible at Kägi Söhne:
Beat Siegfried (Managing Director), Rebecca Willi (Key Account Manager). Responsible at Metzgerlehner Worldwide Partners: Felix Dammann (Creative Direction), Marco Hert (Art Direction), Patrick Meyer (Text), Thomas Hinderling and Alain Schwaar (Consulting), Giovanni Bucca (Production), OnEmotion AG, Martin Hochuli (Conception and implementation for online and mobile), Daniel Frick (Illustration), Detail AG (Photos Packshot/Litho/Creative Retouching).

 The petition committee of the Ticino Grand Council is demanding that the homepage of the Sunday newspaper Il Caffè be blocked. Last weekend, the paper had quoted from secret minutes of meetings and then posted them on the Internet. The case was forwarded to the public prosecutor's office for investigation. According to a communiqué issued by the Commission on Monday, there has been a breach of official secrecy and violations of the Data Protection Act. The published minutes reflected a discussion about naturalization applications. This was controversial because some of the petitioners apparently had criminal records.
The Sunday newspaper Il Caffè is published by Ringier and Rezzonico Editore. It plans to launch the online free newspaper Caffè quotidiano in March (see
).

Starting February 26, 2008, Paddy Kälin will join the team of hosts for the SF program «Sportaktuell.» The 31-year-old has previously worked as a presenter and editor specializing in soccer and alpine skiing. Kälin has been working in the sports department at Swiss Television since 2000. After completing his internship, the Herisau native worked as an editor for «Sport Aktualität,» specializing in soccer and alpine skiing, and as a presenter for «Sportlive.» According to a press release from Swiss Television, he joins the team of presenters alongside Steffi Buchli, Daniela Schmid, Regula Späni, Jann Billeter, Matthias Hüppi, Sascha Ruefer, Rainer Maria Salzgeber, Michael Sokoll, and Bernard Thurnheer.

 Swisscom subsidiary Bluewin TV has been offering TV pictures in HD quality since Monday. The switch-on was carried out stealthily, reports the Abendzeitung Heute in an advance report. According to Swisscom spokesman Carsten Roetz, the telecom company first wanted to make sure that HD really worked. The network operator Cablecom had already trimmed its offer to HDTV three months ago. Unlike its competitor, Bluewin TV does not need any new equipment for this, as the set-top boxes were HD-compatible from the start, according to Roetz. Bluewin TV's 65,000 existing customers will receive the new channels HD Suisse, BBC HD, Anixe HD and Arte HD at the same price as before, Heute continues. Since the HD channels require a larger transmission capacity, however, only users with a fast line can benefit. Bluewin TV offers the possibility to check the connection at Bluewin.ch/checker.