And so it came to pass. As The National revealed a few weeks ago, Dubai has decided to take professional advice to counter what it regards as “negativity” in the international media’s coverage of its economic situation, and appointed the London firm Finsbury to help it change that perception. It is an interesting appointment from several angles.
Finsbury was founded and is run by Roland Rudd, a former Financial Times journalist who quit hackery to make fuller use of his skills of personal interaction, which he had previously honed as president of the Oxford Union. His business was a great success – business journalists in London liked having somebody from their own background who could explain issues in a common language, rather than the “I’ll get back to you” brigade. The clients in turn appreciated the access and influence.
So successful was he that he was able to sell Finsbury to global communications WPP for £50 million (Dh270m) a few years later, retaining executive control of the company via a lucrative earn-out package. Since then, he has gone from strength to strength and Finsbury was recently voted “most influential PR firm” in London’s Square Mile.
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