Health Promotion Board concludes media pitch

The Health Promotion Board (HPB) has appointed Havas Media for online and offline media buying. The appointment is for a year, with the option to extend for another two, according to Gebiz.A tender was called on 20 October 2017, which saw four agencies vying for the account - GroupM Singapore, Havas Media Asia Pacific, IPG Mediabrands Singapore and OMD Singapore. The pitch was managed by R3.Marketing has reached out to HPB for comment.“We were delighted to be able to help HPB drive greater transparency and accountability through this process, setting the stage for a trustful relationship with the new media agency. We believe media agencies, when incentivised the right way, can play a very strategic role for clients in data driven modern marketing," Shufen Goh, principal and co-founder of R3, said.The incumbent on the account was MEC Singapore, which was re-appointed in February last year for media duties, effective from 1 April 2016. The appointment came days after HPB appointed Publicis Singapore as its creative agency. It also appointed GroupM, KRDS Singapore, Possible and Publicis to manage its social media marketing and community management services, with the contract running until August 2020. This followed a tender called in May.Meanwhile on the creative and digital side, last year, HPB split duties for its Health Hub Portal account, and awarded all eight agencies which pitched for the account. The agencies awarded were DDB Worldwide, Mirum Singapore (XM Asia), Possible Worldwide, Web Professional, FXMedia, Novus Media Solutions, King Content Singapore and Digital Boomerang.Most recently, Havas Media promoted executive director Russell Lai to the role of general manager and was reappointed as NETS' media agency last year.