• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer, February 9, 2026

Media experts with old values, judgment and tools, and U.S. legislation and rules are trying to manage technology never envisioned — a theme circulating through the advertising industry as artificial intelligence (AI) technology kicks in to take on everything from ad targeting to agentic tasks.

Ogury CEO Nicolas Bidon told MediaPost that advertisers still struggle to adapt cohesive audience ad-targeting strategies into cross-channel media plans, explaining the challenge to maintain the same message across multiple environments.

Bidon became Ogury’s CEO in December, following a long and distinguished career with WPP and the broader ad-technology industry.

He served as global CEO of GroupM Nexus -- part of WPP -- but joined in 2012 as managing director of Xaxis UK, and later became global CEO of plista, a media company powered by proprietary AI technology.

Data signals gathered from AI combined with 1.4 billion survey data points describing human behavioral traits and attributes create Ogury’s audience ad-targeting clusters. Each are cross-referenced with other types of data -- for example, data gathered from payment cards.

“AI is used to translate briefs from advertisers to determine the correct audience framework to activate campaigns across channels,” Bidon said, explaining how agencies use AI to close the gap between what a brand wants and who they should target.

That approach in being brought into new channels like commerce to leverage those audience segments into Amazon’s network, as well as extended into Walmart Connect. The company is now finishing the technology integration.

Bidon also believes the U.S. should have a federal data and privacy framework, so companies do not reinvent processes more than 50 times.

“It would be helpful from a compliance perspective rather than 25 state legislation,” he said. “We would want regulators to find the correct balance between respecting consumer privacy and not limiting the industry’s place in creating value.”

Relying on AI doesn’t always work out as planned, and that is one of the biggest concerns for Tim Ryan, co-founder and managing director of Steadman Partners, who also pointed to security flaws and data breaches.

“We spun up a Clawdbot as soon as we heard about it, but my concern is that companies will jump in this technology without understanding the huge amount of data leakage coming from these agents,” he said. “Bad actors that can access this data.”

Last week, Ryan and the founder and director of London-based Audience Strategies David Boyle spun out the consultancy Steadman Partners to help company executives understand artificial intelligence (AI).

Clawdbot, also known as Moltbot or OpenClaw, is an open-source AI assistant that runs locally on computers and connects with applications such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Gmail and browsers to manage calendars, send emails, and even control the operating system.

He believes that too many overestimate the potential of technology in the short term, and underestimate the impact in the long term.

Ryan, a longtime “deadhead” (Grateful Dead music fan), has years of experience in brand strategy and marketing with former roles at Hugo Boss, Tomorrow London, EMI Music, Setanta Sports, AOL, and Saatchi & Saatchi.

He also recently took on an advisory board member role at MediaVision, an SEO Agency that helps businesses use their marketing data. MediaVision launched Metis, which uses search data to determine demand, mostly in retail.  

On the topic of adding advertising to AI engines like ChatGPT, Ryan voiced concerns that adding ads to AI engines like ChatGPT could repeat social media’s problems, where a useful technology became harmful due to unchecked negativity and excessive data collection.

He said too many media experts overestimate the potential of technology in the short term, and underestimate the impact in the long term.

“I’m not a big believer for massive regulation, but companies and governments should take more responsibility than they do,” he said.

People also need to ensure that these tools do not dumbed-down society, he said, which made me think of Nicholas Carr’s debate -- whether Google in the long run would make society stupid by giving us all the answers. The article, published in 2008.

“It’s like we have horses and cars going up these newly built freeways, but also Ferraris running past them, and that’s a recipe for disaster,” he said. “The trick is to take a long view.”

It doesn’t always work out as planned, and that’s one of the biggest concerns for Tim Ryan, co-founder and managing director of Steadman Partners. He also pointed to security flaws and data breaches.

“We spun up a Clawdbot as soon as we heard about it, but my concern is that companies jump in without understanding the huge amount of data leakage coming from these agents,” he said. “Bad actors that can access this data.”

Clawdbot, also known as Moltbot or OpenClaw, is an open-source AI assistant that runs locally on computers and connects with applications such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Gmail, and browsers to manage calendars, send emails, and even control the operating system.

He believes too many overestimate the potential of technology in the short term, and underestimate the impact in the long term.

Last week, Ryan and David Boyle, founder and director of London-based Audience Strategies spun out the consultancy Steadman Partners to help company executives understand artificial intelligence (AI).

Ryan, a longtime “deadhead” Grateful Dead music fan, has years of experience in brand strategy and marketing, with former roles at Hugo Boss, Tomorrow London, EMI Music, Setanta Sports, AOL, and Saatchi & Saatchi.

He also recently took on an advisory board member role at MediaVision, an SEO Agency that helps businesses use their marketing data. MediaVision launched Metus, which uses search data to determine demand, mostly in retail.