PP expects China to become its third biggest advertising market within three years. At an advertising conference in Beijing, WPP group executive Sir Martin Sorrell said his agency aims to increase developing world revenues to around a third of its overall total over the next decade. "We have to grow by at least 50 per cent (in China) in the next five to 10 years," Sir Martin told Reuters. He said that the Chinese market currently accounts for around 4 per cent of WPP�s worldwide revenues. "We think China will be the second-largest advertising market by 2008. Now it�s our fifth or sixth-largest market, which is about where its world rank is, he added.

According to CTR Market Research, a leading market and media research company in China, spending on advertising in China grew by 25 per cent last year as advertisers targeted the country�s growing middle class. It stood at 194 billion Chinese yuan (�12.79 billion) last year, according to CTR.... more