Spark Foundry wins global Facebook media review

Publicis Groupe picks up duties for all of Meta's brands.

Publicis Groupe has emerged the winner from a lengthy review conducted by the company previously known as Facebook, with Spark Foundry named global media agency for Meta.

The assignment covers media planning and buying duties for all of Meta’s brands, which include Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Oculus.

Publicis Groupe, Havas, WPP and Dentsu all participated in the review, which began in March. Dentsu handled media buying for the company in some markets, but WPP’s Mindshare handled the bulk of the work globally since 2014. Despite being the incumbent, GroupM pulled out of the review in July.

Facebook spent $650 million USD on media globally last year, of which $405 million was on offline media and $245 million allocated to online, according to Comvergence. RECMA data places Facebook at 40th among global advertisers in terms of spending, and second in the tech sector (behind Google).

The assignment is also the latest major media assignment awarded this year, from global and multi-market assignments from Unilever, Mercedes-BenzDe’LonghiKeurig Dr Pepper and TD to Canadian assignments like OLG, Sunwing and CCM. It is also not the last: the results of Coca-Cola’s joint creative and media review are expected to be announced before the end of the month.