Active Display Group, Australia’s largest point of sale display and signage company, has been acquired by STW Australasia, a marketing and communications services group with more than 75 businesses in its stable. STW says it has brought in Active in a bid to capture the whole of its clients’ advertising budgets. Active Display will round off the capabilities of the STW juggernaut, making it an end-to-end solution provider. STW will acquire 100 per cent of the organisation – which includes more than 390 staff in offices in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Hong Kong.

David Gittus, managing director of Active Display Group

Michael Connaghan, CEO of STW, says the investment is a ‘perfect fit’ with the group’s strategy of evolving quickly to meet changing client needs. He says, “More and more client budgets are being spent in what is called the place sector of the customer journey. The more marketing becomes data driven and digital, the more critical than ever is the consumer experience in store and at point of purchase. “STW already has capability in shopper, point-of-purchase, experiential, activation, shopper insights and logistics management, and the addition of Active Display Group fills out our offering perfectly. It will enable us to have a much broader relationship with clients.” Connaghan says Active Display has already been working with STW agencies on projects; the acquisition deal has been 12 months in the making. Active Display Group also has a 50 per cent stake in fabric signage specialist AFI Branding and a majority stake in box and display mounting company Boxlink. David Gittus, managing director of Active, says the company still has room to grow with its current capabilities and it will continue to expand via acquisitions where it sees an opportunity. The overlap between STW and Active Display clients is only about 10 per cent, making the acquisition a huge growth opportunity for Active in Australia and into Asia. Gittus says STW will also benefit hugely from bringing in a printing company, giving it a leg up on other agencies in a competitive market.  

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