Matthew Freud—Sigmund's great grandson—is a London PR big shot who married Elisabeth Murdoch, Rupert's daughter. A memo floating around today about his New York office has people asking: What does it mean?

Freud Communications is based in London, but its New York office—headed by Lisa Dallos, a veteran media flack who's done PR for US Weekly, Talk, Rolling Stone, George, GQ, CNN, and others—isn't going to be called that anymore. This morning, Matthew Freud sent out a memo to staff:

I wanted to let you all know about a new development in our US business. Lisa Dallos recently introduced me to Hamilton South, ex CMO of Ralph Lauren and now running a very successful agency in NY and LA working in fashion, luxury and entertainment among other sectors. We had been looking at ways to grow our NY offering for some time, and the fit was so good that we decided to partner with Hamilton's company, HL Group. We will work together on projects and share expertise, and for us in London means we now have access to a broader range of people with varied experience that complements Lisa and her team. Both operations will remain independent, but we will work together and also explore the potential to collaborate on larger scale global assignments. The US operation of Freud will move into HL Group's New York-based headquarters, where they have about 60 staff.

A press release that's supposed to be released soon clarifies that all of Freud's NY employees, including Dallos, are packing up and "move into HL Group's New York-based headquarters." What we think happened? Freud was on the verge of shuttering the NY office, but Dallos managed to strike this deal. No one's losing their jobs, we're told, so bully on her. But Freud being Freud, sent out a memo so that by the time that the news is announced, any troubles at his NYC outpost would have vanished; this is simply a great merger opportunity, which "complements Lisa and her team."

Freud is good at PR.

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