by Steve McClellan @mp_mcclellan, August 12, 2016



AT&T has selected Omnicom Group for ad and media duties on its massive $3 billion ad account, the companies confirmed Friday. In addition to creative and media, the scope of work includes digital, data and analytics.

The selection comes after a consolidation review that began in June and pitted the two main incumbent holding companies, Omnicom and WPP.

The firm’s total advertising expenses were nearly $3.3 billion, according to its 2015 annual report. U.S. media spending totaled $1.8 billion last year, down from $2 billion in 2014 according to Kantar Media.

The primary media incumbent was WPP’s MEC, which won a consolidation review back in 2007, when the client was spending an estimated $2.3 billion annually.

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Omnicom’s recently created third media agency brand Hearts & Sciences will lead the media work going forward. BBDO will lead creative.

Lori Lee, Senior Executive Vice President and Global Marketing Officer, AT&T, stated:

“We’ve completed our comprehensive advertising agency review that combines creative, media, data and analytics under one entity. We believe this integrated, best-in-class approach is the future for brands wanting break-through marketing innovation, quality and efficiency at scale.

Both Omnicom and WPP presented very strong strategy, creative and media proposals. Each of them enthusiastically embraced the opportunity to create a new integrated agency model for delivering higher levels of service and value across the board. It was a thorough and thoughtful evaluation, and a tough decision because both firms presented outstanding ideas and both have done terrific work for us in the past. We thank them both for their efforts.

We have selected Omnicom via its BBDO and Hearts & Science units to be AT&T’s integrated creative and media agency. Omnicom has brought together one dedicated team representing the best talent across Omnicom to work seamlessly with us to position AT&T as the world’s premier integrated communications company. A single integrated team allows us to move quickly, innovate at scale and take a data-driven, holistic approach to reaching consumers and businesses. These capabilities are important as we get ready to launch new streaming video entertainment choices that are built for mobile.

We expect a smooth transition of the work to Omnicom will happen over the coming weeks. Like Omnicom, WPP is a world-class group and we appreciate their hard work and 9-year partnership.”

Omnicom added:

“By combining the resources of Hearts & Sciences and BBDO, we are extremely pleased to have won the business and look forward to continue working with AT&T to build an integrated creative, media, digital, data and analytics team that can deliver the best in advertising and marketing ideas, execution and results. This is an opportunity like none other. AT&T is a unique, premier brand that is constantly innovating for its customers and we’re privileged to expand our partnership with them. We look forward to developing break-through work with AT&T around their unique integrated capabilities to serve consumers and businesses.”