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Below is a roundup of last week’s notable industry news, with summaries and our opinions. Being WPP’s new CEO is no bed of roses…

5 Challenges Facing New WPP CEO Cindy Rose
Source: Adweek
July 14th, 2025

Summary: WPP has tapped Microsoft executive Cindy Rose as its new CEO, replacing Mark Read, who will step down in September 2025. Rose brings serious tech credentials—she's currently COO for Microsoft's global enterprise division and previously led Microsoft's Western Europe operations. She's also been on WPP's board since 2019, though that is her only ad industry experience.

The timing is notable. WPP just issued an unscheduled profit warning last week, projecting 3%-5% revenue decline for 2025 amid client losses, sending the company’s share price down 17%. Despite the turbulence, WPP continues doubling down on AI and data capabilities, investing $400M annually on its AI-powered WPP Open platform and recently acquiring data clean room company InfoSum. (WPP may not be done with M&A; there are rumors flying around about some sort of potential deal between WPP and Accenture.)

With Publicis pulling ahead of the agency holdco pack in recent years through its data-driven transformation, and the pending Omnicom-IPG mega-merger, WPP clearly felt it needed someone who understands both tech and large-scale enterprise operations. 

Rose faces significant challenges: turning around WPP's declining share price, proving that massive AI investments can deliver returns, and rebuilding morale among demoralized staff and clients—all while learning an industry she's never technically worked in."

Opinion: Rose's hire signals a potentially ambitious pivot for WPP: transforming itself from a services company into a tech company. While agencies have endeavored to become tech companies in the past (and mostly failed), timing may finally be right for a holdco to make this transition effectively. It won’t be easy. Success will depend on strong leadership and vision for an AI-centric world.

Rose's Microsoft background suggests she may be the right fit. Microsoft sells platforms that other companies build on top of. Microsoft does not consulting services, nor do they sell agency services. Imagine WPP Open becoming the Salesforce of advertising, with companies paying monthly subscriptions to access WPP's AI and data tools. Rose has spent years overseeing Microsoft's transition from product company to platform company generating massive recurring revenue and might aim to do the same for WPP.

This would be a seismic shift for agency ecosystem. Currently, WPP's AI investments in WPP Open and InfoSum primarily serve internal efficiency—helping their own agencies win pitches and deliver campaigns faster. But what if these tools became external products? Smaller agencies could pay for access to WPP's data clean room technology. Brands could license WPP's AI creative tools for in-house teams. Suddenly, WPP isn't just competing for client budgets as an agency—it's extracting value from the entire advertising supply chain as a tech platform.

This strategy would make some sense. Platform revenue is valued much more than agency revenue. WPP’s value has been crushed. While traditional agency growth requires hiring more people and winning more clients, platform revenue grows exponentially with each new user. If WPP can transform even a portion of its business into recurring software revenue, it could command tech company valuations instead of service company multiples. 

Our speculation about why WPP hired Rose might be off base. But it’s surely interesting to ponder. Is WPP starting to play chess while Publicis and others are playing checkers?

Linda Yaccarino leaves X—what it means for advertisers - The former NBCUniversal ad sales chief has departed as CEO, removing a key bridge between Elon Musk and the advertising community. Yaccarino helped restore some advertiser confidence after X's U.S. ad revenue plummeted 65% in 2023, with the platform expected to grow ad revenue 16.5% to $2.26 billion in 2025. Her exit comes as Musk has shifted X's focus toward xAI and away from advertising. Without Yaccarino's relationship-building skills, X's modest revenue recovery could stall—especially since Musk's track record with advertiser relations is, well, not great.

TripleLift Quietly Lays Off A Double-Digit Percentage Of Its Workforce - The SSP let go "less than 20%" of its 450+ employee base per AdExchanger, marking the third round of layoffs in five years. Current CEO Dave Helmreich joined four months ago, while his predecessor also implemented layoffs about four months after taking the helm in 2023. The cuts came after Cannes Lions concluded—a crucial period for business development that companies avoid disrupting. Either new CEOs at TripleLift just fire people, or private equity owner Vista Equity Partners is squeezing harder than expected..

Owning Ad Targeting Is Paying Off For Hearst - The media company's AI-powered targeting solution AURA has improved addressability by 30% to 200% across some audience segments since launching last June. AURA combines behavioral and contextual signals with AI modeling, outperforming traditional approaches. Hearst recently partnered with Amazon Ads to make AURA audiences available through the Amazon DSP, giving Hearst access to real-time shopping data. While most publishers are panicking about AI disruption, Hearst is actually using it to their advantage—smart move.

Behind The IAB Tech Lab’s New Initiative To Deal With AI Scraping And Publisher Revenue Loss - The IAB Tech Lab has launched the LLM Content Ingest API Initiative to establish guardrails for how AI bots use publisher content. The framework includes access controls, licensing terms, usage tracking, and tokenization. The initiative favors a "pay per query" model over "pay per crawl," (like what Cloudfare introduced) meaning publishers get compensated each time their content is used to answer a user's question. IAB CEO Anthony Katsur warns that without widespread adoption, publishers face an "extinction-level event." The initiative is necessary, but likely not a parachute for publishers.

Rebuffed by Chrome, Perplexity Launches AI Browser Comet, OpenAI Reportedly Prepares Its Own - Some of Perplexity's $200-per-month Max subscribers now have invite-only access to Comet, an AI-powered browser that integrates the startup's search tools. OpenAI is also reportedly preparing its own AI browser launch in the coming weeks. Both browsers aim to keep users from leaving their native interfaces, eliminating clicks to external websites and giving these companies access to valuable browsing data. If successful, these browsers could fundamentally change how people browse the web—and deal a serious blow to Google's search dominance.

Omnicom Posts Lower Earnings Amid Interpublic Acquisition - Q2 organic revenue was up 3%. The agency holding company said costs from the IPG merger and severance expenses ate into its profits.

Omnicom confirms the pending exit of influential Annalect chief Slavi Samardzija - Annalect President Adam Gitlin will replace Samardzija ahead of the agency holding company's impending merger with IPG.

LUMA Partners' Q2 2025 Market Report - Despite tariffs and economic volatility, M&A activity grew 25% year over year and public ad tech and mar tech companies are delivering positive earnings.

NBCU Says Surge in Sports Ads Boosts Upfront Sales Haul - NBCU's new NBA rights deal helped the company sign 15% more upfront deals. NBCU also has rights to the Milan Winter Olympics, Super Bowl LX, and the FIFA World Cup.

Tim Sims leaves The Trade Desk - Sims spent 12 years at the leading, independent demand-side platform, most recently as chief commercial officer.

LG Ad Solutions and Viant Integration Looks to Sharpen CTV Ad Targeting, Accelerate Addressable - Advertisers will be able to buy LG's premium smart TV inventory through the Viant DSP as part of Viant's Direct Access program.

Google, Texas clash over upcoming digital advertising antitrust trial - After losing the FTC's antitrust case last year, Google faces another trial on Aug. 11 against Texas and other states.

Snap Taps Reddit Exec Mary Ann Belliveau to Helm North America Ad Sales - Belliveau helped grow Reddit's ad revenue to $1B from less than $100M in five years.

Comscore, iSpot and VideoAmp Get Another Stamp Of Approval From JIC - The vendors reaffirmed their 2024 full certifications.

StackAdapt Launches AI-Powered Assistant Ivy for Faster Data-Driven Decisions - Ivy helps marketers refine their targeting, quickly surface insights, and streamline campaign execution.

Spotify expands automated podcast buying to 170M listeners - Advertisers can now access Spotify's premium podcast ad inventory through its Ad Exchange.

IAB releases Digital Out-Of-Home (DOOH) Measurement Guide - The new guide includes best practices, standardized definitions for impressions, audiences metrics, and more.

The Record CCPA Fine Against Healthline Should Be A Wake-Up Call For Publishers - Healthline will pay $1.55M for ignoring consumer opt-out requests for targeted advertising and sharing sensitive health information without consent.

Stagwell Unveils New Agentic-driven Platform To Boost Efficiency, Outcomes - Assembly CEO Matt Adams will lead the new Stagwell Media Platform, which will use AI to optimize outcomes, trading, and media investments..

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