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THE Indian antitrust body has raided the offices of many global advertising giants, including GroupM, Publicis, Dentsu and Interpublic Group, and a broadcasters’ industry group over alleged price collusion, people with direct knowledge told Reuters yesterday.
Officers of the Competition Commission of India searched around 10 locations after it initiated a case against the agencies and top broadcasters over allegedly fixing ad rates and discounts, said one of the sources.
The raids were being carried out in Mumbai, New Delhi and Gurugram, the first source said. Five other sources familiar with the ongoing antitrust operation confirmed the names of the entities being raided.
The raids come as the ad landscape in India is seeing major shifts following the $8.5 billion merger between Walt Disney and Reliance’s India media assets, which Jefferies analysts say will have a 40 per cent share of the ad market in TV and streaming segments.
They also follow Omnicom Group’s $13.25bn all-stock deal in December to buy rival Interpublic Group, creating the world’s largest ad agency. Omnicom did not respond to Reuters queries.
Spokespersons for ad giant GroupM, owned by Britain’s WPP, US-based Interpublic’s IPG Mediabrands unit, France’s Publicis Groupe and Japan’s Dentsu did not respond to requests for comment.
The Indian Broadcasting and Digital Foundation (IBDF) also did not respond, and neither did the CCI, which does not make public the details of its enforcement action or cases related to price collusion.
The first source said the CCI was investigating how ad agencies allegedly colluded with certain broadcasters to fix ad prices while selling them to clients, and discussed discounts.
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