Pereira & O'Dell Launches

SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwire - April 9, 2008) - Advertising industry veterans P.J. Pereira and Andrew O'Dell today announced the launch of Pereira & O'Dell, an advertising agency heavily influenced by the digital culture and focused on creating cross-disciplinary campaigns for progressive marketers. The company also announced that LEGO Systems, Inc. and PONY are among its first clients.

Headquartered in San Francisco, Pereira & O'Dell has already assembled a full-time, multidisciplinary team of 15, plus additional specialists who will be deployed on a per-project basis. To support growth initiatives, the agency has secured $30 million from ABC International fund, managed in Brazil by a group that includes Arminio Fraga, former president of Brazilian Central Bank, and Nizan Guanaes, a leading international advertising professional.

The new company has its origin in an existing collaboration. During the last three years, Pereira, 34, and O'Dell, 38, worked together as Executive Creative Director and President, respectively, at AKQA, San Francisco, AdWeek's Interactive Agency of the Year 2007. At Pereira & O'Dell, the duo will divide responsibilities, with O'Dell focusing on the business side and Pereira driving creative.

"Pereira & O'Dell is being built more on excitement than differentiation," said co-founder Pereira. "A lot of great agencies focus so much on being different from each other, on specializations and new business models, that they spend more energy on becoming efficient technique-wise rather than inspiring. We're not obsessed with becoming the next revolution; we just want to do things as they should be done today, mixing new and old techniques without any assumptions or prejudice. This is the great thing about working in this industry today."

"It's senseless to subordinate digital to traditional anymore. And conversely, marketers can't assume that everything is happening 100 percent on the web or in other digital devices because that's not how everyday consumers think or live," said co-founder O'Dell. "PJ and I are very excited to be building an agency that will be on the forefront of the explosive combination of digital marketing, traditional advertising, content and PR."

"This year marks several important milestones in our brand history, as we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the original LEGO brick and the 30th birthday of the iconic LEGO minifigure," said Michael McNally, brand relations director, LEGO Systems, Inc. "We're excited to be working directly with Andrew, PJ and their team -- who all grew up playing with LEGO bricks and intrinsically 'get' the brand essence we want to amplify -- to create several initiatives to honor our creative legacy while providing fun, unexpected ways for kids of all ages to rediscover and reconnect with the LEGO brand."

"Our current mission is to reinvigorate the PONY brand and to create fresh, smart and targeted ideas that turn heads and help our consumers celebrate the 'joy of the game,'" said Kevin Wulff, CEO of PONY International. "We're pleased to be among the first clients of Pereira & O'Dell and are impressed with how quickly the team has integrated with our own to become a trusted marketing partner. Pereira & O'Dell has brought provocative thinking that allows us to connect with our consumers in an authentic and engaging way."

Featured as one of the 50 Most Influential Creatives in the world by Creativity Magazine in 2006, and Advertising Age's 40 under 40 in 2007, Pereira is an internationally recognized creative director with 20 years of experience in the technology and advertising industry. He has received more than 50 international awards during the last 10 years and has served as President of the Jury in the interactive categories of the One Show Festival (2007), Cannes Festival (2005), El Sol Festival (2004) and London International Advertising Festival (2001). He has held executive roles both at start up and established international agencies.

Prior to his time at AKQA, O'Dell spent four years as Vice President of Business Development for Carat, the world's largest independent media agency. He joined the company when Carat Interactive acquired Lot21, a leading digital marketing, media and advertising agency that O'Dell co-founded in 1997.

About Pereira & O'Dell

Founded in March 2008, by P.J. Pereira and Andrew O'Dell, Pereira & O'Dell is an advertising agency based in San Francisco, California, heavily influenced by the digital culture and focused on creating cross-disciplinary campaigns for progressive marketers. www.pereiraodell.com