Ad industry buyers line up for more M&A as marketing, adtech competition intensifies

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Ad industry M&A intensifies

Highlights

Publicis Groupe's $2.2 billion LiveRamp deal, Salesforce's $5.7 billion Braze acquisition, and Affle's $420 million Perion buy signal renewed M&A activity in adtech.
Accenture plans to spend $5 billion on acquisitions in FY2027, with Adobe also eyeing further purchases after its $1.9 billion Semrush deal to enhance campaign execution capabilities.
Omnicom, Havas, The Trade Desk, and Zeta Global are all viewed as likely acquirers in areas such as retail media, AI, data, and connected TV as competition from Amazon and Google intensifies.

Likely acquirers and target areas

As reported by Business Insider, bankers, investors, executives and consultants see a new group of likely acquirers emerging after several recent transactions, including Publicis Groupe's $2.2 billion purchase of LiveRamp, Salesforce's $5.7 billion deal for Braze, Affle's $420 million acquisition of Perion and Stagwell's purchase of Freestar.

Jay MacDonald, chief executive of Digital Capital Advisors, says likely deal activity tends to follow advertising budgets, pointing to influencer marketing, retail media and connected TV as areas where acquisitions could land next. Ana Milicevic, cofounder of Sparrow Advisers, says the AI boom is also forcing strategic buyers to reassess ad businesses focused on real-time decisioning, identity and other automated components.

Among the companies highlighted, Accenture is expected to keep buying through Accenture Song after saying last month it plans to spend around $5 billion on acquisitions in its 2027 financial year. Adobe is also seen as a possible buyer after its $1.9 billion Semrush acquisition this year, with advisers expecting it to seek tools that connect content creation with campaign execution and measurement.

Havas, which completes eight acquisitions in the first nine months of 2026, is viewed as a candidate for smaller targeted deals in data, identity, retail media and AI. Omnicom, after completing its $9 billion merger with IPG and portfolio disposals, is seen by industry insiders as a potential buyer in retail media to strengthen assets such as Acxiom and Flywheel.

OpenAI is also drawing attention as it scales its advertising business, saying last month that more than 100,000 advertisers have run ChatGPT ad campaigns over the eight months since the platform launched. Advisers say its adtech integrations with companies including Criteo, Kargo, Pacvue and StackAdapt could indicate capabilities being tested ahead of any purchase, although Joshua Wepman of Houlihan Lokey says deal timing will depend heavily on its planned initial public offering process.

Competitive pressure reshapes adtech strategy

Publicis is widely expected to remain active after LiveRamp, with advisers pointing to possible additions in data and European assets that could complement Epsilon. Sanja Partalo of S4S Ventures also says the French group could pursue an "agentic orchestration" capability that uses AI agents to connect data, measurement and campaign decisions from planning through reporting.

Stagwell, which has made more than 60 acquisitions since 2015, is also seen staying in the market after the Freestar deal. Chief executive Mark Penn says in a recent Adweek interview that the company is looking at acquisitions to expand further in Latin America and strengthen digital transformation operations.

The Trade Desk remains a less certain buyer, but advisers say competitive pressure from Amazon and Google, combined with roughly $1.5 billion in cash disclosed in September, could eventually push it toward a larger acquisition. Possible areas include retail media infrastructure, connected-TV monetization technology or workflow tools tied to agentic media buying.

Zeta Global is another company drawing attention after its share price rises about 70% over the past year and its acquisition-led platform strategy gathers momentum. After last November's Marigold enterprise software deal worth up to $325 million, advisers say Zeta has built a reputation for buying underappreciated assets and quickly integrating them into the Zeta Marketing Platform and its Athena AI agent.

In our earlier article, we examined how AI is raising the cost of standing still for companies, as automation and data-driven tools reset performance expectations and make “average” execution less sustainable. We noted that firms are being pushed to rethink investment priorities, workforce skills, and decision-making processes to stay competitive—an underlying dynamic that also helps explain why strategic buyers are reassessing where to build capabilities in the market.

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