The world’s six biggest media buyers got bigger in 2006, but they still account for less than a third of global and U.S. ad spend, writes MediaPost, citing recent estimates from Paris-based media billings research firm RECMA.
Holding companies WPP, Publicis, Omnicom, Interpublic, Aegis and Havas billed a combined $195.06 billion in 2006 – 6.8% more than their 2005 billings – increasing their share of global ad spending 0.4 percentage points, to 32.5%, according to the article.
Other RECMA estimates of note:
- In the U.S., the 14 largest media buying shops – 13 owned by the Big 6, plus Horizon Media – together accounted for 31.4% of U.S. media buys, up 0.6 percentage points from 2005.
- MindShare, top-ranked among the 14 largest media agencies in the U.S., had billings of $11.3 billion in 2006, resulting in flat growth and accounting for 12.6% among the top14 agencies.
- MediaVest’s share increase of U.S. media billings was the largest – up 1.4 percentage points, to 8.1% – followed by sister agency Starcom’s: up 0.8 percentage points to 10.7%.
Starcom MediaVest Group – the world’s largest media buying network according to RECMA – had $25.58 billion in billings and increased its share among the 12 largest media networks globally to 13.1% in 2006, up from 11.9% in 2005. Its overall market share is 7.4%, RECMA estimates.
