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Who bought what and why this year? Here’s a (mostly) comprehensive list of all the notable ad tech, agency and digital content deals of 2025.

Private equity finds ecommerce publishers aren’t worth what they used to be; Salesforce rethinks its faith in agentic AI; and CBS News accidentally encourages people to pirate its content.

Programmatic media buying is expected to account for the majority of growth in the CTV market in 2026. This year alone, over 90% of CTV ad dollars were transacted through programmatic pipes. That data isn’t surprising. Programmatic has solved a real problem by helping brands reach TV viewers with targeted precision at much lower costs.

The founders of six AI startups offer insights on the founding journey and what problems their companies are solving.

H&R Block’s marketing strategy focuses on Gen Z and relatability, both during tax season and beyond.

FAO Schwarz is getting into data; ChatGPT is better at driving traffic than we thought; and Honey’s bad behavior might go beyond affiliate hijacking.

Roku’s streaming data will now be integrated into Nielsen’s campaign measurement and outcome tools, the two companies announced on Monday,

Think you know Snapchat’s audience? Think again, says Ajit Mohan, Snap’s chief business officer. Mohan gets real and busts myths, including the idea that Snap is just for kids and its youngest users aren’t big spenders.

Agencies are shifting away from third-party ad tech; ChatGPT is throwing all kinds of monetization spaghetti at the wall; and Axel Springer is looking to buy.

Seedtag CEO Brian Gleason joins Inside the Stack to explain contextual’s resurgence and how neuro-contextual AI shifts the focus from keywords to emotion and environment.

First, the VAB clashes with Nielsen over Big Data, and Pinterest teams up with tvScientific. Plus, Google Ad Manager rolls out major EU changes, from ditching Unified Pricing Rules to deeper data sharing with publishers.

Let’s close out the year with a roundup of the most impactful CTV stories of the year, from Netflix’s ad surge to Nielsen’s measurement missteps.

Enjoy this weekly comic strip from AdExchanger.com that highlights the digital advertising ecosystem … 

Anthropic’s AI-operated vending machine sparks chaos; ad revenue should remain a top priority; and Roblox has potential for in-game ads – and concerns.

Viant struck a deal with IHeartMedia and its Triton Digital advertising platform that will make IHeart’s broadcast radio inventory available through Viant’s DSP.

The film and TV studio Lionsgate has chosen Comcast’s FreeWheel as its exclusive ad server to help manage and sell the growing volume of ad inventory Lionsgate creates with new FAST channels.

Unauthorized ID stuffing, rampant reselling and misaligned signals inflict incredible damage on the programmatic ecosystem. If publishers want to compete with the walled gardens, we must raise our standards. 

Attribution measurement is still a mess; video podcasting struggles with effective advertising; and NIL deals are taking off for student athletes.

2026 is going to be a big year for NBCUniversal. Not only will it play host to the 2026 Winter Olympic Games in Milan, it’s also going to broadcast the Super Bowl, the NBA Playoffs, the regular MLB season on NBC and the FIFA World Cup on Telemundo.

The Trade Desk is cutting its workforce. A company spokesperson confirmed the news with AdExchanger. The layoffs affect less than 1% of the company.

One of the DraftKings founders now leads HardScope, parent of FaZe Clan, aiming to bring FaZe’s content and distribution magic to creators beyond gaming.

Jay Richman, Amazon’s VP of product and technology, on how AI-generated ad creative can still stand out at scale without becoming generic or too samey samey. Plus: The risks brands face if they wait too long to embrace AI.

Inside Coca-Cola’s pivot from TV advertising to influencer marketing; Netflix inks another exclusive video podcast deal with iHeartMedia; and Madison & Wall predicts slow US ad spend growth in 2026.

The VAB is accusing Nielsen’s Big Data + Panel of producing “instability, inconsistency and irrational” TV audience measurement results, particularly when compared to its legacy panel-only product.

Fluency plans to invest its new funding into AI and engineering to bring more automation into the platform.

CTV isn’t an emerging channel anymore. It’s a fully established, essential part of the media mix. Advertisers now understand its reach, flexibility and ability to drive measurable outcomes.

On Tuesday, Infillion launched fully agentic media execution platform built on MCP, marking a shift from the programmatic to the agentic era.

Meta’s not beating the scam ads allegations; SEO tools are getting into AI prompts; and the telcos are at it again.

The grocery chain Albertson’s is trying to reduce the time and number of clicks it takes to add an item to an online shopping cart. It’s new click-to-cart product should help.

Samsung Ads built a new integration with Amazon Publisher Cloud (APC), which is a clean room solution within the larger Amazon Publisher Suite (APS), the companies announced on Monday.