British advertising giant WPP has gone past US-based Omnicom Group as the world's largest owner of media agencies based on reported revenue.

WPP, under the leadership of Martin Sorrell as the chief executive, has been on a worldwide acquisition binge and had bought major stakes in the region's largest marketing company The Holding Group (THG).

Joseph Ghossoub, Group Chief Executive Officer of THG, said: "We are obviously delighted and happy with WPP results for 2008 – a further proof of good management and industry leading achievements.

"I have no doubt that despite all the difficulties faced worldwide by many industries, WPP will maintain its leadership position in the communications sector and will continue to be a trend setter of our industry. As far as the region is concerned, although regional figures of revenue and profits are not publicly made available, we believe that WPP has a similar leading position."

Stating the aggressive revenue generation by WPP, Sorrell pointed out that 27 per cent of sales are derived from fast growing emerging markets. Industry experts also point out that the company has raked up the largest debt load for WPP in its quest to become the biggest player in the field of marketing communication.

Under the umbrella of WPP are some of the largest media and marketing firms including Ogilvy & Mather and JWT and other marketing, media and PR companies such as Wunderman, MindShare and Burson-Marsteller. Together these companies posted $13.6 billion (Dh50bn) in revenue for the year 2008 and managed to squeeze past Omnicom, which reported a revenue of $13.4bn.

"Their growth to numero uno level became evident with the inclusion of two months of revenue from Taylor Nelson Sofres (TNS), which WPP snapped up in a $1.9bn deal last October," said an industry observer.

Confirming this WPP conveyed that it would have reached $15.4bn in revenue last year, if it were to include a full year of TNS revenue.

WPP employs more than 100,000 people in more than 2,000 offices in 106 countries. Listed on London Stock Exchange, the company formally moved its headquarters to Dublin, Ireland, for tax reasons in September 2008. In recent years, WPP has acquired TNS, Grey Global Group and 24/7 Real Media to catch up with Omnicom. It ended last financial year with a total debt of $8.2bn, including debt WPP took on in its TNS acquisition. WPP's total debt increased last year by $3.4bn – more than the total debt load on the books of rival Omnicom ($3.1bn), as reported in AdAge.

In a recent meeting with investors Sorrell said: "I'd just like to say in the 25, 30 years that I've been in the business, I have never seen anything quite like this."

"Although the economic gloom has heightened recently, with further earnings disappointments, surprise dividend cuts, continued financial restructurings and rights issues, we still believe there will be a recovery of sorts in 2010," AdAge cited him as saying.