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Omnicom, working toward finalising the acquisition of competitor IPG later this year, is developing plans for integrating its businesses.
The global advertising group is aligning agencies in areas of strength where IPG's business units will also sit when the takeover closes.
Omnicom posted revenue of $US3.7 billion in the March quarter, with organic growth at 3.4%, led by Media & Advertising and Precision Marketing, which together grew at 7%.
Omnicom is the second holding company to reveal March quarter results. Publicis Groupe posted organic revenue growth of 4.9%.
“We have successfully organised our portfolio at Omnicom by aligning our agencies into marketing disciplines or practice areas to strengthen our depth of expertise and capabilities and to enhance collaboration across the group,” Omnicom CEO John Wren told analysts in a briefing.
“This structure provides a seamless path for bringing together our operations with Interpublic, adding deeper expertise and capabilities to each practice area following the closing of the acquisition.
“Moreover, across the board, our practice areas will be underpinned by the best-in-class tech and data platforms, including Axiom, Omni, and Flywheel Commerce Cloud, a combination that will position us to thrive in an AI-driven future.”
The marriage of rivals brings together the third biggest advertising group, Omnicom, with the fourth, IPG, to form a company with 100,000 people and revenue of $25.6 billion (net revenue of $20 billion), with 57% of that in the US.
The companies remain on track to complete the transaction in the second half of 2025.
Omnicom said it had made progress on integration planning work, which will help it meet a targeted $US750 million in run rate cost synergies.
“We have clearly identified areas of synergy opportunity, and our integration planning is well underway to ensure we achieve our targets," Wren told analysts.
"We believe our multi-year plan and the successful acquisition of Interpublic will create significant shareholder value."
Omnicom, unable to cut through the political fog of an uncertain economic environment, has split its full year outlook into high and low points, a bet each way on how the year will run.
The company ended the year to December with organic growth of 5.2%, exceeding the advertising group's own estimates.
However, the March quarter organic growth came in at 3.4% as the company faces a "challenging" economic environment.
And Omnicom changed its full year outlook to organic growth of between 2.5% and 4.5%
“Nothing about the current environment impacts our confidence in our business and strategy or our ability to create new services and win new business,” Wren told analysts.
Questioned about the wide range in the forecast, Wren said Omnicom is being “conservative” in lowering the bottom end.
“We're striving to get to the top end,” he said.
“There is still some confusion In the marketplace … how some of these tariffs and other moves get negotiated or do they stay in place?
“So it's that uncertainty where we didn't want to surprise anybody later in the year … we chose to be conservative.”
However, the diversification of Omnicom’s portfolio of agencies across geographies, industries, and service offerings would help in the “uncertain” environment ahead.
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