MAM
Havas Media Group India strengthens its outdoor offering, partners Tribes
NEW DELHI: Havas Media Group India has entered into a strategic partnership with Tribes, a leading integrated OOH, retail, and activation agency. This alliance is designed to ensure Havas optimises the full potential of OOH advertising as part of a cross-platform strategy, to drive more meaningful media experiences in line with Havas Group’s ‘Meaningful Brands’ philosophy. Tribes will serve Havas’ clients across industries with specialists embedded into every stage of the campaign process to drive results.
With a vision to deliver superior return on investment (RoI) and experience (RoX), Tribes offers technology-enabled customer experience across OOH and retail – whether it is immersive retail experience through AR and VR, or helping brand capture consumer leads and insights, Tribes provides an integrated experiential and effective solution.
Despite an arduous first half of the year for the outdoor medium, the industry reported a pickup of 25-30 per cent in recent months according to Industry estimates and is slated to only grow given the upcoming festive season.
Havas Group India group CEO Rana Barua said, “During this transformative time for the OOH industry, our partnership with Tribes underscores our commitment to building long-term impactful relationships. This alliance fits in perfectly with our global operating system MX, which is providing our clients the tools to build more meaningful media experiences creatively and at scale.”
“Tribes’ superior return on experience driven by technology and innovation has forged many long-term partnerships and a proven track record of client success in producing award-winning memorable campaigns. This partnership with Havas is yet another milestone and underscores our commitment to building long-term impactful relationships.” said Tribes CEO-MD Gour Gupta.
Havas Media group MD – India Mohit Joshi said, “Along with a pan India presence, Tribes brings a rare blend of creativity with insights to help brands succeed with out-of-home media. Moreover, with the country gradually opening-up, and the festive season approaching, OOH and activation are slated to play a significant role in building media strategies for brands and it is the right time to invest in this space. We are delighted to partner with Tribes and look forward to transforming the OOH landscape leveraging their expertise to provide our entire spectrum of clients with advantage of integrated experiential solutions, which beautifully fits in with our village way of working”
Brands
Estée Lauder to shed 10,000 jobs as new boss bets on digital shift
The cosmetics giant raises its profit outlook but stays silent on a possible merger with Spain’s Puig, as job cuts deepen and a three-year sales slump weighs on the turnaround
NEW YORK: Stéphane de La Faverie is not done cutting. Estée Lauder announced on Friday that it plans to eliminate as many as 3,000 additional jobs, taking its total redundancy programme to as many as 10,000 roles, up from a previous target of 7,000 announced a year ago. The company, which owns La Mer, The Ordinary, Tom Ford, and Aveda, employs roughly 57,000 people worldwide. The mathematics of what is now being contemplated is stark.
The fresh round of cuts is expected to generate a further $200 million in savings, bringing the total annual savings from the programme to as much as $1.2 billion before taxes. That money, De La Faverie has made clear, will be ploughed back into the turnaround.
A CEO in a hurry
De La Faverie, who took the helm in January 2025, inherited a company that had endured three consecutive years of annual sales declines. His response has been to move fast and cut deep. A significant portion of the latest redundancies reflects his push to reduce headcount at US department stores, long a cornerstone of Estée Lauder’s distribution model but now a channel in structural decline. In their place, he is accelerating the shift toward faster-growing online platforms, including Amazon.com and TikTok Shop, a pivot that is reshaping not just where Estée Lauder sells but how it thinks about its customers.
The numbers are moving in the right direction
Despite the pain, there are signs the medicine is working. Estée Lauder raised its profit outlook for the remainder of the fiscal year, guiding for adjusted earnings per share in the range of $2.35 to $2.45, above analyst estimates and a notable step up from the $2.05 to $2.25 range it had guided for in February. Organic net sales growth is expected to come in at 3 per cent, the company said, at the high end of the range it set out in February.
The share price tells a mixed story. After De La Faverie took charge, the stock surged nearly 60 per cent, buoyed by investor optimism that a longtime company insider could finally arrest the decline. But 2026 has been rougher: the shares have fallen 27 per cent this year, weighed down by disappointing February results and the overhang of unresolved merger talks with Spanish beauty giant Puig Brands SA. The company gave no additional details about those discussions on Friday, leaving the market to guess.
Silence on Puig
The proposed tie-up with Puig remains the most consequential unknown hanging over Estée Lauder. A deal with the Barcelona-based group, which owns brands including Carolina Herrera and Rabanne, would reshape the global luxury beauty landscape. But with nothing new to say and a turnaround still very much in progress, De La Faverie is asking investors to trust the process.
Three years of sales declines, 10,000 job cuts, and a merger that may or may not happen. At Estée Lauder, the overhaul has barely started.
