Wednesday 19 July 2006

Another one bites the dust

In the wake of SageCircle and Kensington Group, we can now report at Serendipp, a UK analyst relations consultancy, has also closed.

Readers might recall that last December we had some criticisms and harsh comments about that company. In Serendipp's opinion, "Analysts only do two things: size markets and do case studies".

Our comments was this: "This is so far from being right, it's not even worth calling wrong. Sizing markets and writing case studies is what gets outsourced to India. The real work of analysts is quite different: and that is why analysts have substantial advisory, consulting and custom research businesses. If an AR advisor doesn't realize this, then heaven help their clients."

Indeed, the company has now closed. A posting on the firm's blog explains that those the firm's partners have taken employment elsewhere. Rest in peace.

However, this story has a little tickle are the end. Our chiding of Serendipp last years ended this this comment which, in hindsight, is amazing prescient: "It would be far better to understand one's limitations and keep only do what you know how to do. In that respect, kudos to Hill & Knowlton. If Duncan's latest post is correct (my Norwegian is rusty) their European AR is led by their partner agency in Oslo, Gambit, which hired a former IBM AR manager in 1999."

What's interesting is that one of Serendipp's partners has been hired by H&K to work on its European analyst relations. Let's hope his boss in Oslo doesn't let her analyst relations business go the same way as Serendipp.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Boy, you're behind the times - perhaps you should try RSS ;-)

I joined H&K to head up AR in the UK when I was made an offer I'd be daft to refuse and Ahmed was snapped up by T-mobile. That was already a couple of months ago now.

We had a beer over the weekend and I can report that we're both thoroughly enjoying our respective jobs; for my part, I'm working with some cracking clients.

Duncan's 'latest post' as you refer to it was made over 6 months ago and even that was somewhat untimely (you're not the only one with rusty Norwegian, it seems).

The AR team at H&K will be launching a blog shortly. We think that what we have to offer is pretty impressive and we want to share some insights with interested parties.

As ever, we'll be using our real names.

theARpro said...

Honestly, we are glad you enjoy your new jobs. Our only point was that, considering the poor insight your former firm had shown, I hope that you do better working for H&K than you did working for Serendipp.

Our reference to a "latest post" is in an italicized quote which we preface by saying that the quote from last year. Is that the best you can do? Let's hope you get a bit more attentive to detail too.

But seriously, have a good time at H&K. If you're over here visiting Josh, let's meet up.