By Patrick Coffee
Advertising holding company Omnicom Group can proceed with its proposed acquisition of rival Interpublic Group after the companies promised not to collude on politically motivated ad boycotts, the Federal Trade Commission said.
Omnicom, which owns agencies including BBDO and TBWA, in December agreed to buy IPG, whose portfolio includes McCann Worldgroup, in a transaction that would create the world's largest advertising company. The all-stock deal values IPG at around $13 billion and will create a conglomerate with approximately $25 billion in net revenue, based on 2024 figures for each company.
Executives at Omnicom and IPG had expressed confidence that the government would approve their plan, calling the incoming Trump administration more business-friendly. However, the FTC in March requested additional information from Omnicom and IPG, signaling a review of the deal.
The commission has also been investigating whether advertising holding companies and left-leaning advocacy groups broke antitrust laws by steering ad spending away from platforms such as Elon Musk's X.
In the agreement announced Monday, the companies pledged not to collude with other firms to move advertising dollars away from media outlets based on their perceived political or ideological alignment. The agreement doesn't include any admission of violations by Omnicom or IPG.
"Today's decision and order eliminates the potential for costly litigation while ensuring that Omnicom and IPG abide by the antitrust laws postmerger," FTC Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson said in a statement. "Moreover, this agreement requires Omnicom and IPG to cooperate with the commission in any investigation relating to media-buying services -- and I have already noted that investigating and policing censorship practices that run afoul of the antitrust laws is a top priority of the Trump-Vance FTC."
Omnicom also agreed not to develop so-called exclusion lists of sites or platforms where it doesn't recommend advertising, and said it would submit an annual report for the next five years demonstrating its compliance with the agreement.
"This is an important step toward the completion of the proposed acquisition and creating a new era in which we help clients grow with a comprehensive range of marketing and sales solutions, incorporating both creativity and technology," John Wren, chief executive of Omnicom, said in a statement.
The FTC's approval is technically provisional, subject to 30 days of public comment and a final vote from the commission. The agreement, when final, will also release Omnicom and IPG from demands for information the commission made this month as part of its probe into alleged politically motivated ad boycotts against sites like X.
Other disputes over advertising and ideology continue. After a significant pullback in advertising on X, formerly known as Twitter, the social-media company sued both marketers and watchdog organizations such as Media Matters for allegedly colluding in an illegal ad boycott. X has threatened to drag more advertisers into court if they don't increase their spending on its platform, The Wall Street Journal reported this month.
Media Matters on Monday sued the FTC, arguing that the commission was trying to silence the group on behalf of Musk.
"This is a significant free speech issue, and Media Matters will not back down from this fight," Chairman and President Angelo Carusone said in a statement.
And probes of the Omnicom-IPG merger remain open elsewhere. Regulatory agencies in the U.K. and Australia have each opened the deal to public comment to determine whether it would violate existing laws by creating an uneven playing field among companies that offer advertising- and media-buying services.
Omnicom and IPG have said that they expect the deal to close during the second half of this year.
Write to Patrick Coffee at patrick.coffee@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 23, 2025 18:54 ET (22:54 GMT)
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