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Ad-tech

Desk brief

State of Play

Revised Nov 1, 2026

The moment. Search is paying for the AI that is replacing it. Adweek’s Kendra Barnett reports Alphabet’s Q3 search revenue growth slowed to 12% from 17% the quarter before, with executives citing AI Mode’s lower ad monetization, and TechCrunch has Google taking AI Mode ads international anyway. Google is also moving to personalize those ads with signals from Gmail and Photos. Meta rebuilt the engine underneath its feed: AdExchanger’s Allison Schiff reports an LLM-based ranking model and a retrieval overhaul letting Andromeda score more than a billion ads per second. OpenAI kept building its ad business in public, taking ChatGPT ads to 26 more countries for 89 in all, adding an automatic bid strategy, and applying creative enhancements to existing ads from October 30 unless an advertiser opts out. The FTC cleared Publicis’s LiveRamp acquisition under a consent order with a five-year data firewall.

The tension. The platforms are editing the work and moving the liability to the buyer. Adweek has Meta’s AI reworking creative without being asked, and Meta’s new terms make advertisers solely responsible for whatever it generates, a change Meta pushed from October 30 to November 20 after publisher trade bodies objected. Identity is closing in one browser and opening in another inbox: Apple confirmed it has broken identity resolution vendors’ tracking on Safari, while Google’s policy now lets Gmail, Drive and Photos data feed ads once a user connects them. CTV’s plumbing is still the weak joint: The Measure’s Jon Lafayette reports Wurl finding 89% of CTV ad requests lack a usable program name, and executives from Magnite to The Trade Desk name frequency waste as the problem nobody has fixed. Indie agencies now ask aloud whether they need a DSP at all.

Who’s moving. Google, with search growth at 12% and AI Mode ads going global. Google again, on Gmail and Photos signals in AI Mode ads. Meta, scoring every impression with an LLM. Meta again, delaying its terms to November 20. OpenAI, at 89 countries. The FTC and Publicis, on a five-year firewall around LiveRamp. Apple, closing the Safari workarounds. Wurl, on CTV requests with no program name. Skydance, weighing Google over FreeWheel. FreeWheel, following NBCU in the Comcast split. Madhive, adding AdImpact spend data across 210 markets. Pinterest, launching Programmatic Deals with Magnite.

What the desk is watching. Whether Meta’s November 20 date holds, and whether AI Mode’s ad load closes the gap in Google’s search growth or widens it.

Meta adds premium ad formats and new metrics for brand campaigns

eMarketer’s Grace Harmon reports that Meta rolled out new advertising tools for brand-building, including Ads Super Burst, which lets advertisers book exclusive three-to-24-hour windows for “TV-like scale” during major sales or cultural events.

Magnite opens agentic media buying for CTV home screen ads

eMarketer’s Asa Hiken reports that Magnite is opening up its CTV home screen ad inventory to agentic media buying, letting AI agents purchase placements on streaming device interfaces.

Biggest news no one is talking about Apple blocking Trade Desk, LiveRamp, Permutive

ExchangeWire’s Dana Lee reports that Apple’s iOS 27 update blocks The Trade Desk from serving ads on Safari, expanding a preexisting policy against data broker domains that do addressable ID matching; ID5, Audigent, LiveRamp, and Permutive were also added to the block list this month.

Snap merges ad formats, adds AI product picks to Chat before holidays

MediaPost’s Colin Kirkland reports that Snap is merging Dynamic Product Ads with Sponsored Snaps into a “Commerce Power Pack,” bringing AI-powered product recommendations into Chat, plus new ROAS and cross-channel optimization tools ahead of the holiday shopping season.

datafuelX folds in Audyns to launch DFX Marketplace for linear TV

The Measure’s Jon Lafayette reports that datafuelX, having acquired Audyns in September, is launching DFX Marketplace, a platform letting advertisers plan and buy data-driven linear campaigns.

Publica flags true-live metadata to fix sports CTV ad gaps

VideoWeek’s Tim Cross-Kovoor reports that Publica’s Tom Page says broadcasters now trust CTV ad stacks for tentpoles like the World Cup, but smaller live sports inventory still lacks clarity on whether a broadcast is truly live or a rerun, prompting Publica to add live-flag metadata.

DataFuelX debuts cross-publisher video ad marketplace with 13 outlets

Variety’s Brian Steinberg reports that DataFuelX, led by TV-sales veterans Dan Aversano and Michael Strober, launched DFX Marketplace, a single point of entry for buying linear and CTV inventory across 13 premium video publishers.

Startup Starling pitches show-level data as its CTV SSP edge

AdExchanger’s Alyssa Boyle reports that Starling, a CTV supply-side platform founded by Michael Bassik, launched last month with about 20 employees after a year in stealth.

Flo and Motorway build teams to game AI answer engines

Adweek’s Trishla Ostwal reports that Motorway tracks LLM outputs in real time, seeing new content cited within 24 hours, while Flo Health has a manager dedicated solely to LLM discoverability working across channels.

OpenAI seeks agency partner to lock ChatGPT ads into media plans

ExchangeWire’s Sheila Obeng-King reports that OpenAI has posted a job for an agency partner tasked with making ChatGPT advertising a standing line item in holding companies’ media plans, not just a one-off buy.

ChatGPT ad base triples to 60,000 advertisers in a month

MediaPost’s Joe Mandese reports that New Street Research’s Dan Salmon found ChatGPT advertisers topped 60,000, up from 20,000 a month earlier, projecting half a million within a year based on Pinterest, Reddit and Snap growth curves.

Google tests prescription drug ads inside AI Mode

Adweek’s Trishla Ostwal reports that Google has confirmed it is testing ads for branded prescription drugs in AI Mode and AI Overviews, with pharmaceutical advertisers running standard text and Shopping ads labeled “Sponsored.” The test started this month and is limited to the U.S.

Opinion: Data providers must prove neutrality after acquisition, not just promise it

AdExchanger’s guest columnist argues that Infillion’s purchase of Foursquare, following Publicis-LiveRamp, shows consolidation forcing a reckoning: owning a data or measurement provider while also selling media technology raises real questions about equitable access and data flow.

OpenAI’s help docs reveal Ads Manager Beta is live, with a detailed troubleshooting guide

OpenAI Help Center publishes a troubleshooting guide for Ads Manager Beta, covering account setup, campaign uploads, ad rejections, and reporting discrepancies.

OpenAI, IAS detail ad guardrails for ChatGPT at Adweek panel

Adweek’s Justin Chin reports that OpenAI’s Samantha Jacobson and IAS CEO Lidiane Jones discussed how ChatGPT separates its organic and advertising models, with IAS overseeing whether guardrails around sensitive conversations are honored.

Adweek maps 11 best-funded startups chasing AI search optimization

Adweek’s Kendra Barnett reports that roughly one in ten online searches globally now runs through standalone AI tools like ChatGPT or Claude rather than Google or Bing, per Similarweb data.

Nestlé Mexico unifies 70-brand data to break ad-targeting siloes

AdExchanger’s Joanna Gerber reports that Nestlé México, present in 90% of households nationwide, used to target each of its 70-plus brands separately until it connected its CRM and Amazon clean-room data to Treasure AI’s agentic platform.

Coca-Cola’s AI commerce playbook: context will define agentic shopping

Ad Age’s Garett Sloane reports that Coca-Cola is rethinking how it gets products recommended as shoppers increasingly rely on AI agents to decide what to buy.

OAAA forms technical council to standardize OOH automation

Adweek reports that OAAA launched a Technical Advisory Council of OOH tech leaders, chaired by Lamar’s Ian Dallimore, with founding members from JCDecaux, Clear Channel, OUTFRONT and others.

Adap.tv co-founder Grenager joins Infra as SVP of Product

Advanced Television reports that Teg Grenager, who co-founded Adap.tv and led the IAB group that wrote the VAST and VPAID standards, has joined Infra TV as SVP of Product.

OpenAI hires agency dealmaker to embed ChatGPT ads in media plans

Adweek’s Trishla Ostwal reports that OpenAI is hiring an Agency Partner for its Ads Solutions team to drive advertiser revenue through holding company relationships.

Brands say ChatGPT ads won’t move the needle this holiday season

Modern Retail’s Gabriela Barkho reports that advertisers are testing ChatGPT ads but expect little holiday budget to shift from Google or Meta, citing high costs and unproven sales results. Measured’s Terence Einhorn says ChatGPT’s cost-per-click runs six times Google’s.

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