Scuttling off into a much wider world

Marketing agency TOUCH/CAST Next partners Lee Parkinson (left) and Andrew Hawley.

It generated 2.5 million text messages from Telecom customers wanting to blow up a ship - the ex-Naval frigate HMNZS Wellington, sunk off Wellington as a diving attraction - now experimental marketing agency TOUCH/CAST has its sights set on taking on the world.

The two-person partnership in Wellington joined Auckland media agency Starcom and new media company Modica to form TOUCH/CAST Next. The new entity, to be launched on Monday, will work exclusively with Starcom clients going "beyond traditional media planning and buying".

"We would really like us to be known as a strategically-oriented media partner," said Starcom's Australasian chairman Kevin Malloy, who has led the Publicis Groupe company since its launch into New Zealand 18 months ago.

The partnership aligns TOUCH/CAST Next partners Lee Parkinson and Andrew Hawley with Starcom's global clients, such as Proctor & Gamble. Malloy said the new company would initially work on clients with a "natural fit" such as Sony.