Octagon (Sports Agency)
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| Subsidiary of Interpublic Group | |
| Founded | Washington, D.C., United States (1982) |
| Headquarters | Tysons Corner, Virginia (USA) |
| Website | www |
Octagon is the global sports and entertainment content marketing arm of the Interpublic Group of Companies (NYSE:IPG)
In 1970 Donald Dell, Frank Craighill, Lee Fentress and Ray Benton founded the Washington, D.C. law firm, Dell, Craighill, Fentress & Benton, one of the first sports law and sports management firms in the world. Dell's friendships made through his U.S. Davis Cup captainship allowed him and his University of Virginia law school friend Craighill, and partners, to begin their sports agent careers with clients such as Arthur Ashe and Stan Smith. Dell was also instrumental in the founding of the Association of Tennis Professionals and is considered one of the fathers of sports marketing and the sports agent business.
The firm enjoyed great success during the formation of the ATP and would become ProServ in 1976. As ProServ evolved, difficulties between partners arose and in 1982, Craighill, Fentress, and W. Dean Smith left to found Advantage International. Craighill became Managing Director and the firm rose to become an industry rival of fellow full service agency IMG in the 90's. Craighill came to realize that Advantage's historical 20% growth rate since its founding would not be sustainable in the long run, due to the increasing complexity and competition in the athlete representation industry, without the addition of greater capital and resources. This led to the sale of Advantage and its leadership including President, Phil de Picciotto, Mickey Lawler, and Jeff Austin to Interpublic Group. In 1997, Interpublic group successfully completed the merger of Advantage and other agencies to form Octagon.
In 1970 Sir Frank Lowe was the head of the advertising agency Collett Dickenson Pearce (CDP). In 1979 Lowe arranged sponsorship of the Queen's Club Championships which became known as the Stella Artois tournament, an arrangement that lasted almost 30 years.
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