The moment. The ad unit inside the assistant stopped being a pitch and became a product. OpenAI is piloting Sponsored Agents, which turn a ChatGPT ad click into a branded chat with an AI agent rather than a site visit, with Wayfair testing at limited scale, and launched conversational ads alongside CRM and ecommerce integrations. Amazon DSP became a managed buy path into ChatGPT ads with Delta Vacations among the first US pilot brands, while OpenAI keeps control of delivery and placement. Criteo became ChatGPT Ads’ first commerce partner on 4 billion globally mapped product SKUs. Thrad opened a self-serve platform for building campaigns inside large language model conversations. OpenAI named Mark Bambury head of EMEA ads. Google answered at Rethink ROI with an open-standard Universal Cart across Search, YouTube and Gmail.

The tension. Every prior ad format ended at a destination someone else could observe. A Sponsored Agent does not: the click opens a conversation held inside the seller’s own surface, logged by the seller, reported by the seller. That is the least observable inventory yet sold, and it arrived the same week a judge declined to break up Google’s ad-tech business and ordered behavioral remedies instead — a result ad-tech executives read to AdExchanger as a warning sign for the FTC’s case against Amazon. Concentration is going the same way: Google, Meta and Amazon took 56% of US ad revenue in 2025, up from 53% in 2024.

Who’s moving. OpenAI, on Sponsored Agents, conversational ads and an EMEA ads chief. Amazon, wiring its DSP into ChatGPT and buying Art19. Criteo, betting 4 billion SKUs and more than $1 trillion in annual transaction data on being the commerce layer. Thrad, going self-serve. Google, on agentic commerce, and on an AI licensing pilot that pays publishers only when content significantly contributes to Gemini and AI Overviews answers, which critics call a fig leaf. Profound, raising $180 million at a $1.8 billion valuation for AI search marketing. Madison and Wall, forecasting global ad spend up 11% in 2026 past $1.3 trillion with US revenues up 13%. Wurl, enriching bid requests across more than 140 billion monthly CTV impressions. The Trade Desk, cutting about 575 of 3,843 staff.

What the desk is watching. Whether a Sponsored Agent conversation is ever auditable by anyone but the platform that hosted it, and whether the behavioral remedy in the Google case sets the ceiling for what the FTC can win from Amazon.