WPP's Grey Acquires South Africa's Volcano Group Amid M&A Frenzy

WPP has snapped up a second South African based company in under two weeks after it agreed to acquire advertising and communications company The Volcano Group in the region.

WPP said in a statement that its wholly-owned operating company Grey will acquire a majority stake in the company and, after the deal is completed, it will rebrand it as Grey Africa.

Volcano was founded in 1994 and provides integrated marketing services covering traditional and digital advertising, PR, insight and social. Its clients include Procter & Gamble, First National Bank, Sony and Consol Glass.

For the year ending 31 May 2013, Volcano's unaudited consolidated revenues were approximately $5.9m (£3.5m, €4.3m), with gross assets of $2.5m.

On 6 May, WPP acquired Africa's largest independently owned digital marketing agency, Quirk, as the British advertising giant seeks to expand.

WPP confirmed in a statement that it will acquire Quirk, which is still subject to regulatory approval, after the South Africa group "built a strong reputation for helping clients adapt and win in an ever-changing digitally-enabled world."

Quirk has five agencies across Africa and in London, the company employs 200 people. Clients include Distell, Capitec Bank, Woolworths, Caltex and Tyco.

Quirk's unaudited consolidated revenues for the year ended 28 February 2014 were approximately £7.9m, with gross assets at the same date of approximately £3.8m.

WPP's digital revenues (including associates) were well over £3.5bn in 2013, representing almost 35% of the Group's total revenues of £10.2bn.

WPP has set a target of 40-45% of revenue to be derived from digital in the next five years.