June 24th-June 30th // Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes
Below is a roundup of last week’s notable industry news, with summaries and our opinions. The big story: Comcast and NBCU are breaking up…
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Top Stories 👁
Comcast to spin off NBCUniversal and Sky into separate company
Source: NBC News
June 29th, 2026
Summary: Comcast is breaking itself up again. The company announced Monday that it's spinning off NBCUniversal into a standalone, publicly traded company that would include Universal Pictures, NBC, Telemundo, NBC News, Peacock, Bravo, its theme parks, and UK broadcaster Sky. Comcast will keep its broadband, cable, and wireless business.
This is round two for Comcast. In late 2024, Comcast spun off most of its cable channels (MSNBC, CNBC, USA, Syfy, and others) into a separate company now known as Versant. This time, it's the crown jewels (film, broadcast, streaming, and theme parks) heading out the door.
Mike Cavanagh, Comcast's current co-CEO, will run the new NBCUniversal. Michael Angelakis, a former Comcast CFO, returns to lead Comcast. Chairman Brian Roberts will stay involved with both companies. The split is expected to close in about a year. Comcast will hold onto a stake of up to 19.9% in NBCUniversal for up to a year after that.
The move comes as Paramount Skydance works to close its $110B Warner Bros. Discovery deal (news broke that the UK could hold it up), and as Nexstar tries to finalize its acquisition of Tegna. Comcast shares closed up about 4.5% on the news.
Opinion: We thought TV was consolidating! We were told that (content) + (distribution & data) + (ad tech) has always been the big TV consolidation vision. While Fox & Roku, Paramount & WBD, Amazon & MGM, and other recent deals give us versions of this vision, this deal is giving us the opposite. So why are they doing it? First off, Comcast (distribution & data) and NBCU (content) never quite figured out how to truly be additive to each other’s businesses over their 15-year marriage. Comcast now wants out so it can focus on broadband and wireless (distribution + data). Comcast specifically wants out of content. Okay, but then what about ad tech?
Apparently Comcast is keeping FreeWheel (“apparently” is a key word here; FreeWheel wasn’t brought up on the investor call and its fate is unclear), its ad tech ad serving business for thousands of video / TV publishers. FreeWheel is exciting and growing. And it doesn’t need NBCU to keep growing. If anything, NBCU probably held FreeWheel back since NBCU’s competitors were wary of using their rival’s tech. As video and TV ad supply proliferates, the content itself becomes less valuable, while the pipes and data become more valuable. FreeWheel cares about scale, integrations, and being plumbing for as many publishers as possible.
Perhaps Comcast is betting that untethering FreeWheel (ad tech) from NBCU (content), hitching it more closely to Comcast’s core business (distribution & data), and letting it spread its wings is a better long-term position than fighting Netflix and YouTube for streaming viewership (content).
(Or perhaps we’re completely wrong and Comcast will spin-off FreeWheel too. 🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️)
Other Notable Headlines 👀
The hunt for a post-LiveRamp successor is already underway🔒 - With Publicis set to acquire LiveRamp, vendors used Cannes as a chance to pitch ad execs and agencies on taking over its neutral role in the data ecosystem. But industry sources say that role was never really about being neutral. LiveRamp's real advantage was the sheer scale of connections and integrations it had built over time. That's a tough thing to replicate from scratch, so some challengers (e.g. Hightouch) are taking a different approach entirely. Instead of recreating LiveRamp's network, some vendors are building activation tools directly into a client's existing cloud data warehouse, skipping the need for a third-party data ecosystem. That approach can mean lower costs and more control over sensitive data. Some expect more deal activity ahead, as specialist identity and data vendors (e.g. ID5, MadConnect) get acquired by companies trying to recreate what LiveRamp offered.
Omnicom and NBCU are building ads that adapt to what you're watching🔒 - Omnicom Media and NBCUniversal have teamed up on a new ad targeting tool. It combines Omnicom's audience data from Acxiom with show-level details from NBCU's content library. The idea is to let brands tailor their ad creative to specific moments in a show, not just the show itself. A nature documentary, for example, could trigger an ad for an EV or a wellness brand based on themes like the outdoors or sustainability. The system, announced at Cannes Lions, is being tested now and is expected to roll out in the US by year end.
iHeartMedia expands ad partnership with Amazon - The two companies are deepening their existing relationship. The combined offering pairs Amazon's data and tech with iHeartMedia's creative and sales teams. iHeartMedia will now resell Amazon's ad inventory across properties like Prime Video, Twitch, Amazon Music, Fire TV, and Alexa. In return, iHeartMedia advertisers gain access to the Amazon DSP along with Amazon's shopper data, enabling better targeting across iHeartMedia's podcasts and digital content.
Other Notable Headlines
(that you should know about too) 🤓
Miroma Group acquires Ad Results Media for big US push - London-based Miroma Group has bought a majority stake in Ad Results Media, a top buyer of podcast and audio ads, marking its biggest US move since 2002.
Unlock deeper insights for YouTube brand campaigns - Google is rolling out new reporting tools for YouTube brand campaigns, including Shorts Ad Actions and globally available Attributed Branded Searches, which tracks search volume triggered by an ad view.
Supreme Court opens midterm ad floodgates - The Supreme Court struck down limits on coordinated spending between political parties and campaigns, a decision expected to flood the airwaves with more midterm ads, particularly in battleground states.
Advertisers say they need more data from Netflix - Ad buyers say Netflix gives incomplete IP address data, making geotargeting less precise than on rival streaming platforms like Disney, Paramount, and NBCUniversal.
That’s It For This Week 👋
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