Aegis halves payouts to directors

Aegis Media, the UK-based media-buying and research group, halved its payouts to directors to just over £3.5m last year. Jerry Buhlmann, who was promoted to chief executive on 1 May 2009 , was the highest paid Aegis director, taking home a remuneration package of £974,000. This represents a 14.4% increase over his £851,000 pay packet in 2008. Aegis did not pay out any cash bonuses last year, but Buhlmann received a deferred bonus of £334,000 for achieving performance targets in previous years. The chairman, John Napier, received £510,000 last year, a significant increase over the £124,000 he received in 2008. This was because on top of his £200,000-a-year chairman fee he was paid an extra £300,000 for taking on the role of interim chief executive for more than a year. Aegis, which implemented a severe cost-cutting plan last year to cope with the downturn , reported a total remuneration bill for directors of £3.6m. In 2008 the total payout was £7.2m. However, this included the £2.1m for Robert Lerwill, the former chief executive who was ousted in November 2009 and given a £1.4m termination payment . Aegis paid out a total of £616,000 in termination payments for directors. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email [email protected] or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. • If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".