“In the age of AI, the name of the game is connect or die,” he said.
“The only way to connect a marketing ecosystem is to have a connected identity. We’re basically doing two things to get that; making sure we have the best first-party data stack that translates into the largest level of identity, [and investing in] CoreAI, which allows us to do things with our data we couldn’t do a couple of years ago,” Sadoun added.
When Publicis unveiled CoreAI in 2024, backed by a $320 million investment, it put global CSO and Publicis NY CEO Carla Serrano at the helm. Fourteen months on, she said she’s seeing more demand from clients (especially in CPG and finance) to build propriety AI into their tech stacks.
“Owning our data has been the sort of the fulcrum that allows us to do that,” she explained. “These businesses want customized data sets that give them a competitive advantage that’s not out there in the marketplace.”
Beyond scale and innovation, the Lotame deal also marks a geographical play from Publicis.
Scott Hagedorn, Publicis’ global chief solutions architect, told ADWEEK that while Epsilon already had a strong hand in the U.S. and Europe, Lotame would drive its APAC and EMEA expansion.