Online advertising in Cannes: AI favours the supply side

Big tech platforms are extending their advertising lead by deploying existing AI strengths to expand functionality and offer advertisers streamlined performance.

A cohesive model for chatbot advertising is still elusive. While in the process of defining its positioning, it currently impacts discovery more than search.

Scale no longer guarantees agency advantage: value capture is shifting away from providing services and towards owning the processes, tools, IP, and media.

Recently awakened sleeping giant Amazon is using its vast resources to ramp up an aggressive open web stance, offering advertisers low take rates through its DSP.

Adtech firms risk destroying their own margins in response, so are increasingly extending their positions across the value chain as they compete to offer ‘end-to-end’ services.

2026 will be make or break for the agency holding company model as Omnicom resets and WPP’s need to see the benefits of its turnaround becomes urgent.

Display advertising is forecast to grow c.7% in 2026 despite lacklustre consumer confidence, out of sync with the gradual economic recovery.

Online advertising has doubled its share of online consumer spend since 2015. Major ad platforms account for over 40% of all UK display advertising spend.

Mature media’s prospects more closely align with the UK economy, with real term growth unlikely this year.

Advertising is in a structural shift due to AI and the video boom. AI tools are growing the reach and capabilities of smaller advertisers, fuelling robust demand. 

WPP must challenge Publicis’s dominance in 2026 and show it is positioned to benefit from AI even as Omnicom and IPG combine to create a new global behemoth.

Amazon is taking the fight to adtech by strengthening its connected TV and retail media positions. Adtech is building partnerships and becoming more end-to-end in response.