by Stephanie Hamel
(Reuters) – Publicis said on Thursday it would invest 300 million euros in artificial intelligence (AI) over the next three years, with the aim of placing AI at the center of its operations to become the first “intelligent system” in the advertising industry.
Ahead of the publication in February of its 2023 results, the French group announced that it intended to invest 100 million euros in AI this year thanks to “savings made internally”.
“This investment will therefore have no impact on the group’s operating margin in 2024, and will contribute slightly to that of 2025,” he said in a press release.
Publicis also said that, according to preliminary data, its organic growth last year was 6.3%, above the target range of 5.5%-6% announced last October.
On a strategic level, “it was important for us to show the financial market that we are starting from a position of strength”, declared the group’s general director, Arthur Sadoun, during a press conference, while the Publicis’ recent strong results go against the slowdown experienced by the advertising industry.
In its press release, Publicis indicates that AI is placed at the heart of its platform organization to bring together all of its own data in a single entity, CoreAI, whose development began in the second half of 2023 and whose capabilities will be deployed gradually in the first half of 2024.
Half of the 100 million that will be invested in AI this year will be used for training and recruiting teams, it is specified in the press release, while the other half will be dedicated to the purchase of licenses, software and cloud computing infrastructures.
(Written by Stéphanie Hamel and Jean Terzian)
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