Cantos

Cantos produces corporate videos. It is owned by Brunswick Group and the CEO is Lucy Parker. Lucy Parker is the brother of Alan Parker of Brunswick, and a former TV documentary producer 'who chairs corporate imaging company Trinity Management'[1].

It was launched in 2001 :

"The new communications channel for corporates and institutional investors has been developed by a newly formed company, Cantos Communications. Backed by Cazenove, the UK broker, and Brunswick, a UK financial communications group, the web-based service will initially focus on European companies."(Financial News of May 21, 2001)

Cantos sponsored the 6th annual conference of the Institute of Economic Affairs in February 2005 and Parker addressed the conference on pensions.[2]

PR TV

According to the Financial Times (July 3, 2001):

"What it is without the spin is PR TV. It is a video service for chief executives. Rather than have their message filtered through journalists or analysts, CEOs can have Cantos Communications, which is part owned by Brunswick and Cazenove, the investment bank, make a video of them or other senior staff addressing the main issues facing the company. Cantos will give investors, analysts and journalists the chance to see the CEO, with sleeves rolled up in his or her natural habitat, telling it like it is - without interruption, distortion or heckling. The video clip can then be distributed over the internet or in tape form to people who want a piece of the average chief executive, but get little or no "face-time".

"It has produced 12 paid-for "in depth videos" for eight clients, including Invensys, the industrial group, and Safeway, Mothercare and WH Smith, the retail groups. There are about 45 staff."

Cantos is owned by some of the City's best-known names, but made a £5.4m operating loss in the year to March 31 2002, according to documents filed at Companies House. Shareholders include Cazenove, the investment bank, Alan Parker, the City spin doctor, and Brunswick, Parker's financial PR firm. Documents filed at Companies House also reveal that Alan Parker increased his investment in the firm during the year, investing an undisclosed sum through his pension fund.^[3]

Board of Directors

• Lucy Parker: Prior to establishing Cantos, founded and managed Trinity Management Communications where she advised senior management figures on how best to develop and deliver their messages to key audiences, internal and external. Before founding Trinity, Lucy was a BBC documentary producer and a theatre director.
• Tessa Bamford, Client Director: joined Cantos as Client Director after 18 years as an investment banker initially at BZW and then Schroders for 12 years, latterly as a Director. She has worked in both capital markets and corporate finance in both the UK and US.
• Roddy McDougall, Editor-in-Chief: Joined Cantos from Trinity Management Communications where he was an adviser to a range of large corporate clients. Previously, he was Head of Home News at ITN and Head of Special Projects. He spent 17 years in journalism, including Head of News at Reuters / GMTV. He has also worked as News Editor on Channel Four News and spent 5 years with BBC Television News.
• Paul G. Smith, Technical Director: Co-founder of Dutch e-payment service SmartAxis, responsible for guiding the company's technologies out of AT&T Unisource via a management buy-out. For the eight years before that, he served as technology adviser for the BBC World Service, BskyB, Apple Computer and VMARK Software.
• Rosie Catherwood Business Development Director: Previously Citigate Dewe Rogerson, most recently founder and Managing Director of Citigate Dewe Rogerson, India. She has advised companies and governments on their Initial Public Offeringss, privatisations and other financial communications externally and internally.
• Andrew Tyler, Finance Director: Cantos with 9 years experience in financial control. He spent 4 years as a financial controller within two growing SMEs and prior to that, he spent 5 years in line accounting roles within major companies in the oil and gas sector. Andrew qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Price Waterhouse in 1992.

Source

Affiliations

• Institute of Economic Affairs

Contact

Cantos Communications Ltd 16, Lincoln's Inn Fields Holborn London WC2A 3ED Tel: 020 7936 1333

This is the same address as Brunswick.

Notes

1. ^ Fletcher R.(2003)'Cantos raising cash after £5.4m operating loss', Daily Telegraph, 22/02/2003.
2. ^Profile of the Parker clan: SLATER L.(2005)'The fabulous Parkerboys,' Evening Standard (London), Oct 14.