Part of the funding will support QobliQ’s acquisition of Passhold, the holding company of UK sponsorship agency brandRapport.

QobliQ is led by Xavier Quattrocchi-Oubradous and Roland Giscard d’Estaing, the founders of Paris-based sponsorship consultancy Sponsorclick. Both have backgrounds in mergers and acquisitions and investment banking.

Patrick Bradley, manager of IMAC says that the acquisition of brandRapport is key to QobliQ’s ambition to become an international group. He adds: ‘Sponsorship marketing has the ability to deliver high return on investment for brands which are facing increasing media fragmentation, and it requires strong and subtle expertise.’

brandRapport was originally formed in 1982 as Craigie Taylor International, which became GEM in 2002 following its acquisition by sports and entertainment marketing group CSS Stellar. Management led the buy-out of GEM in 2005 and re-launched the company as brandRapport.

The agency offers both consulting and implementation services and clients include Vodafone, E.ON, Lenovo, AXA and Nationwide. It opened a full-service operation in Hong Kong in August 2005, and has consultants in Singapore and Japan.