Brands are questioning whether to keep renting customer identity infrastructure. Publicis’ LiveRamp acquisition has sparked debate on data ownership. The industry faces a rare chance to redesign how customer data is managed.
Publicis’ $2.2 billion acquisition of LiveRamp is prompting brands and publishers to reconsider how they manage one of their most valuable assets: customer identity. For years, companies have layered new platforms-loyalty programs, e-commerce, apps, retail media, and customer data platforms-on top of each other, amassing more customer signals than ever. Yet, the real challenge is not data scarcity, but the complexity of making that data actionable across fragmented systems.
Many organizations still rely on workflows built for the cookie era, moving customer records between platforms in ways that made sense a decade ago but now feel outdated. As cloud infrastructure has evolved, the question arises: why not resolve identity where the data already lives, reducing the need for constant copying and transformation?
This debate came into sharp focus at Cannes Lions, where industry leaders discussed the implications of the LiveRamp deal. The session, titled ‘How to Survive in a Post-LiveRamp World,’ featured voices from Lemonade Projects, ID5, TransUnion, Aqfer, and PMG. While panelists agreed LiveRamp has delivered significant value, some described it as an “easy button” for activating first-party data, while others compared it to a toll road-pay to move your data where it needs to go.
What stood out was the consensus that, if starting from scratch, no one would build customer identity infrastructure the same way today. Some saw the Publicis acquisition as accelerating an inevitable transition, while others argued that simplicity still matters for teams under pressure. However, no one advocated for simply swapping LiveRamp for another supplier without rethinking the underlying architecture.
Instead, the deal is seen as a catalyst for brands to define the real business problems they want to solve and to design solutions based on current capabilities, not legacy constraints. This shift is especially relevant as AI becomes more embedded in marketing and customer experience, making real-time recognition and response a core expectation.
For publishers and marketers, the choice is clear: continue renting identity infrastructure or invest in building it internally. As customer understanding becomes a critical asset, the industry faces a pivotal decision about ownership versus outsourcing. This echoes findings that challenge long-held assumptions about digital audiences, such as research showing ad-blocker users are more likely to pay for content, as discussed in recent analysis of digital consumer spending patterns.
