Publicis completes LiveRamp acquisition, launches AI marketing engine with client-control pledge

Publicis clients can connect customer data, advertising and AI tools inside their own systems through a newly launched offering, the company says. Publicis Groupe completed its acquisition of LiveRamp on November 2, 2026, enabling the launch of an AI Growth Engine that combines LiveRamp’s data collaboration platform with Epsilon’s identity capabilities.

Publicis is pitching the combination as a way to avoid a choice its chairman and CEO, Arthur Sadoun, describes as costly either way: hand data to large, closed platforms for easier access to scale, or pay consultants to build custom connections. His proposed alternative is a preconnected system that clients can use without surrendering control of their data or technology.

Connecting customer data to campaigns and agents

The engine brings several marketing jobs into the same offering. Publicis says clients can enrich their data, use it across media channels, personalize content and measure business results. It also says the system can generate proprietary intelligence for clients’ AI agents. The stated scope therefore extends beyond producing advertising content to the data and measurement that support campaigns and automated work.

For audience building, Publicis says clients can add information to their first-party data—the information they hold directly—using RampID and Epsilon’s identity tools. The company says this adds thousands of attributes and makes billions of prospects addressable. Those are company-supplied scale claims, describing the information and potential audiences available through the combination rather than measured gains from a customer campaign.

The distribution side draws on LiveRamp’s connected ecosystem, which Publicis says includes 25,000 publishers and 500 technology and data partners. It also covers retail networks, closed technology platforms, integrations with large language models and Publicis’ own media network. Publicis says clients can use those connections to reach audiences across platforms and link marketing activity back to business outcomes.

Collaboration with other businesses is another part of the launch. Publicis describes preconfigured connections to retailers, streaming platforms and brand partners, rather than custom integrations for each relationship. Its tools for secure data collaboration include clean rooms and zero-copy capabilities, which the French-language announcement describes as allowing clients to create new datasets with partners without moving the data. Publicis says the resulting insights can feed clients’ own AI models.

Joining Publicis allows us to give clients a foundation to scale agentic marketing with complete data ownership and control.

Scott Howe, CEO of LiveRamp

Three promises about who stays in control

Publicis calls the engine private by design. It separates its ownership pledge into three commitments covering where information resides, who owns the assets created through collaboration and whether clients remain free to choose other suppliers:

• Data stays in clients’ environments, with clients retaining ownership and control of their data and intelligence.
• Clients own the proprietary data and intelligence assets they co-create, rather than giving up that AI-related intellectual property.
• Clients choose their technology and partners. Publicis describes this as zero platform lock-in and says clients control their connected data and AI network.

The engine also connects to Publicis’ wider services. The company identifies Publicis Sapient’s infrastructure modernization work, Marcel’s AI-agent activation layer, and its creative, media, influencer and commerce capabilities as parts of that offering. Alongside the integration, Sadoun pledged to preserve LiveRamp’s identity, culture and neutrality within Publicis.

The launch announcement does not provide pricing or measured customer results. Its promises of immediate business impact and freedom from lock-in remain Publicis’ claims, not demonstrated outcomes presented with the launch.