Next Fifteen Communications Group plc owns five independent subsidiary PR brands: Text 100, Bite and The OutCast Agency in its Technology PR division and Lexis and M Booth in its Consumer PR division. These brands operate as autonomous businesses, which allows the Group to service competing clients. All, however, are leaders in digital public relations. The Group also owns an investor relations business, The Blueshirt Group and a policy communications business, 463 Communications, which comprise the Corporate Communications division. The group also owns a digital consultancy, Beyond and a research business, Redshift Research which form the Digital and Research division. Finally, the group owns an integrated communications digital agency, Connections Media LLC, which specialises in politics and public affairs.
Next Fifteen has 53 offices in 17 countries with a client list that includes many of the highest-profile international brands.
The Group employs around 1,100 people and has become one of the world’s most respected communications groups.
The Group has achieved this level of global coverage largely through organic growth but has in recent years supplemented that with some notable acquisitions, including Applied Communications (which was merged into Bite Communications) in the US in 2003, The OutCast Agency, also in the US, in 2005, and Lexis in the UK in 2005. In May 2007, Redshift Research was established as a further subsidiary.
The Group continued to expand its presence in the consumer PR market with the acquistion of M Booth in August 2009. In October 2009, Next Fifteen acquired the Asian PR assets of Upstream Marketing and Communications Inc., which involved offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore and Sydney, which have been added to the Bite business to form its APAC region. In September 2010, the Group acquired a digital agency called Type 3 with offices in San Francisco and London. This business was merged with Context Analytics to form Beyond, a new digital consultancy.
In November 2010, the Group acquired an 85% stake in San Francisco-based The Blueshirt Group, LLC, an investor relations company that services the technology market. In May 2011, the Group acquired an 80% stake in CMG Worldwide Limited, trading as Bourne, a global, full-service digital agency with offices in Glasgow, London and New York. In April 2013 the Group acquired an 80% stake in Connections Media LLC, a digital agency specialising in integrated communications for politics and public affairs – with offices in Washington DC and New York. The Group remains ambitious and is committed to international expansion, and intends to open more offices for existing brands, with the possibility of further acquisitions where the strategic fit and value are compelling.