Publicis Groupe is increasing its budget for acquisitions in a “slightly more aggressive” M&A program in 2025.
Already this year the France-based global advertising company has splashed out to buy Atomic 212 in Australia.
And last year the company acquired Influential, an influencer marketing company and AI-powered platform serving more than 300 brands.
This year Publicis plans to spend €800 million to €900 million in specific areas: first-party data to feed CoreAI; production to deliver intelligent creativity; digital media to reinforce personalisation at scale; and technology to substantiate engineering capabilities.
Over the past 10 years, Publicis has been focusing on acquiring innovative product and services that increase the addressable market, help clients differentiate and drive growth
“This is why over this period we have spent more than $12 billion in data tech and AI,” CEO Arthur Sadoun said when briefing analysts on full year results.
Publicis CFO Loris Nold told the analysts Publicis has a “very good” pipeline of deals at the moment.
“That's why we want to be slightly more aggressive in 2025,” she said.
Publicis in 2023 invested roughly €170 million and in 2024 €1.2 billion. Looking over 24 months, that almost 700 million a year. So if you look at the 2024 months horizon that is an average of €700 million.
The current plans are an acceleration.
Publicis this week claimed the title of the “largest” advertising group in the world after posting organic growth of 6.3% in the December quarter.
This translated to full year organic growth of 5.8% with overall revenue of €16.03 billion and net revenue of almost €14 billion.
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