8931: Marcus Graham Meets Torrence Boone.

The Marcus Graham Project presents Man Behind The Brand: Torrence Boone, Google.

7790: Sandbox In A Pine Box.

Adweek reported Interpublic Group dissolved Sandbox, a 3-year-old New York unit created to win Johnson & Johnson communications planning work. IPG reassigned President and Chief Creative Officer Wayne Fletcher to McCann Erickson. Why do the holding companies always hire the Black guys to run enterprises destined for failure?

IPG Folds Sandbox
Unit chief Wayne Fletcher joins McCann

By Andrew McMains

Interpublic Group has quietly folded Sandbox, the New York-based unit it created three years ago to win a share of Johnson & Johnson’s communications planning duties in North America.

Unit president and chief creative officer Wayne Fletcher and an assistant have joined IPG’s McCann Erickson, where Fletcher has assumed the new position of innovation partner.

The creation of Sandbox was key to IPG winning a significant chunk of the North Americ an communications planning account, alongside Naked and WPP Group’s JWT. Initially, IPG staffed the unit with communication planners from different types of agencies, including media shop Universal McCann and digital shop R/GA.

Sandbox subsequently added projects from Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy (Hennessy) and Coca-Cola. The shop, however, failed to gain enough critical mass to operate on its own, and new McCann Worldgroup CEO Nick Brien wants communications planning to be integral to McCann’s offering, according to sources.

At McCann, Fletcher, 40, will continue to work on Hennessy and Coke as needed, an agency representative said. The J&J assignment has been absorbed by J3—a 125-person unit of IPG’s Mediabrands that handles most of the holding company’s media business from J&J—and sister creative shops that work for the client.

In his new role at McCann, Fletcher is expected to forge connections between client brands and Hollywood, the music industry, technology companies, media owners and content-production firms.

“Wayne will be tasked with increasing the depth and breadth of our creative network and to connect us to the leading creative minds across many industries and to use those connections to help inspire new ideas and new solutions for clients,” said McCann New York president Thom Gruhler, to whom Fletcher reports.

Additionally, Fletcher will lead the development of new communications platforms that McCann can sell to clients. In this capacity, Fletcher will work with brand planners and creatives under the banner of Brand Farm.

Fletcher, who holds a doctorate in applied social psychology, described his role as being a “catalyst for different types of solutions via different partners,” adding, “Innovation will be a strategic imperative for the agency.”

7445: Do A Google Search, Boone’s On Top.

From Adweek…

Google Adds Ex-Enfatico CEO Boone

By Brian Morrissey

Google is beefing up its agency relations team with the addition of former Enfatico CEO Torrence Boone.

Boone is Google’s new managing director of agency relations for North America. He will work under Penry Price, vp of global agency and industry development, as Google attempts to craft close relationships with shops that have often viewed it warily.

Boone led the WPP Group’s unsuccessful attempt to craft a dedicated agency for Dell. Prior to being named to head Enfatico, Boone was president of Digitas Boston.

“Agencies are some of our most important partners,” Price said in a statement. “They’re crucial to the growth of the advertising industry and Torrence will work closely with them to ensure that Google adds value for agencies and their clients, and develops products to address their most important needs.”

Google’s agency relations team works with shops to craft campaigns that use Google’s analytics and tech products.

Boone’s appointment follows the departure of Erin Clift, Google’s previous head of North American agency relations. Clift left the company in June to join AOL, now helmed by former Google top ad sales executive Tim Armstrong.

Prior to joining Digitas, Boone held roles at Avenue A (now Razorfish) and Bain & Co.

Boone was tapped to lead what was then called The Da Vinci Project in May 2008. At the time, the effort was heralded as an experiment in crafting the agency of the future by bringing together an integrated shop dedicated to Dell. The shop struggled from its inception, and WPP finally folded it into Y&R last April.

5492: Boone On Board.

WPP’s Project Da Vinci finally lived up to its “new kind of marketing organization” hype by passing on the usual suspects—old White guys, that is—when selecting the CEO. Given all the criticism the enterprise has already received, the man will definitely have his hands full. At least no one can blame him for the potential agency name of Synarchy. Congratulations and good luck to Torrence Boone. Here’s what AdAge.com reported…

WPP Names CEO for Dell Shop
Former Digitas President Torrence Boone Will Head New Global Agency

By Rupal Parekh

NEW YORK -- After months of speculation, WPP said today it has named Torrence Boone, former president of Digitas, Boston, CEO of the global agency it is building from the ground up to service its first client, Dell.

“The opportunity to play a leadership role in the creation of a new agency, built to spec, with an ambition to redefine the client-agency relationship, comes along perhaps once in a lifetime,” Mr. Boone said in a statement. “I’m thoroughly excited about Project Da Vinci’s prospects and look forward to working with an exceptionally talented team to tackle the marketing challenges of Dell and other clients in today's dramatically changed media, marketing and customer landscape.”

Mr. Boone, 38, who declined to grant an interview today, comes to the start-up venture after several years at Digitas, which he joined in 2001. He previously served as VP-general manager at interactive shop Avenue A. Earlier, Mr. Boone, who holds an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School, was a senior manager at Bain & Co., where he focused on the health-care/pharmaceuticals and consumer-products areas.

He will officially take the reigns in early June, will be based in the agency’s New York headquarters and will report directly to WPP Group Chief Executive Martin Sorrell.

‘A new kind of marketing organization’
“The goal from the start was to design and build a new kind of marketing organization that not only provides unique solutions for Dell, but meets other clients’ marketing needs and does so using developments in technology to guide and measure its marketing decisions,” Mr. Sorrell said in a statement. “Torrence is ideally suited to this critically important leadership role. His deep experience across multiple marketing disciplines and his reputation as a developer of innovative marketing programs make him uniquely qualified to lead Project Da Vinci as we focus on reinventing the approach for integrated marketing services. We believe that Project Da Vinci will provide a template for other clients with similar desires.”

Mr. Boone’s appointment is long-awaited; it has been nearly five months since WPP was handed Dell’s three-year, $4.5 billion marketing contract, with the understanding that the holding company would build it a custom-made global agency network.

In his new role, Mr. Boone will be responsible for an agency with hubs in four U.S. cities, as well as London, Beijing, Singapore and Sao Paolo, and a staff of 1,000 or more staff globally. He will also have the help of a leadership team assembled ahead of his arrival. It includes Valerie Hausladen, managing director, Austin office; Kelly McGinnis, chief corporate communications officer; Matt Rayner, chief media officer; Jack Reynolds, chief talent officer; John Roulston-Bates, chief technology officer; Joe Scangamor, chief operating officer and chief financial officer; Ken Segall, chief creative officer; Stephen Sonnenfeld, president, consumer-solutions group; and Jeffrey Wilks, president, business-solutions group.

With a CEO in place, Da Vinci will focus on, among other things, establishing a new name and identity, which it expects to introduce soon.