• by Richard Whitman , Columnist, February 16, 2015

Publicis Group's VivaKi is decentralizing its trading desk model and will distribute programmatic ad trading across other Publicis media shops including Starcom MediaVest, ZenithOptimedia and others. VivaKi CEO Stephen Beringer says 120 ad traders will be spread out across multiple Publicis agencies.

The move aims to integrate programmatic ad-buying with the holding company's other media offerings. Of the reorganization, a VivaKi spokesperson said, “We are taking programmatic planning and activation services closer to the media planning process, where programmatic expertise belongs."

In a way, it's very much like how interactive as a standalone area of expertise was incorporated into the broader offering of an agency and, more recently, the way social media has moved from guru-land to mainstream adoption across agencies and clients.