{"id":830555,"date":"2025-02-28T13:12:14","date_gmt":"2025-02-28T19:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/28\/criteo-we-no-longer-plan-our-business-around-the-deprecation-of-third-party-cookies\/"},"modified":"2025-02-28T13:12:14","modified_gmt":"2025-02-28T19:12:14","slug":"criteo-we-no-longer-plan-our-business-around-the-deprecation-of-third-party-cookies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/28\/criteo-we-no-longer-plan-our-business-around-the-deprecation-of-third-party-cookies\/","title":{"rendered":"Criteo: \u2018We no longer plan our business around the deprecation of third-party cookies\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Ronan Shields<\/a><\/span> \u00a0\u2022\u00a0 February 5, 2025<\/span> \u00a0\u2022<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n Ivy Liu <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Criteo\u2019s latest earnings call represented the passing of the baton between outgoing chief executive Megan Clarken, and its incoming CEO Michael Komasinkski, with the former of the pair underlining the overhaul that marked her four-year term of office. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe no longer plan our business around the deprecation of third-party cookies,\u201d said Clarken, later noting how ad retargeting represented 40% of its business, as it exited 2024, compared to 2020, when she first took the reins.<\/p>\n

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The fortunes of Criteo, a pioneer of ad retargeting based on the use of third-party cookies, are widely regarded as a proxy for how the industry is faring now such audience targeting tools are losing their utility as a result of privacy expectations around the globe. <\/p>\n

The impact of Apple\u2019s Intelligent Tracking Prevention in Safari predated Clarke\u2019s arrival, but it was Google\u2019s confirmation of the planned deprecation of third-party cookies in Chrome soon after her arrival that fundamentally altered the digital advertising landscape, Criteo\u2019s strategic moves since. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

That impact was demonstrated earlier <\/strong>today <\/strong>when Criteo posted revenues of $553 million for the three months to December 31 to today, representing a decline of 2% year-on-year, while full-year revenue was $1.9 billion, equating to a 1% decline. Albeit, company leadership highlighted how profit margins improved for both reporting periods.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, retail media revenues \u2014\u00a0the flagship priority of Clarken\u2019s time in office, including significant non-organic growth activity \u2014 grew 25% year-over-year in 2024. Meanwhile its more traditional performance media business grew 8% year-over-year at constant currency\u00a0during the same period, albeit there was a notable 6% decrease during the closing quarter of the year.<\/p>\n

Looking forward, the company leadership forecast that revenue growth would be in the \u201cmid-single-digit growth,\u201d with first quarter revenue guidance in the range of $256 million-to-$260 million.<\/p>\n

One of Criteo\u2019s major strategic shifts in the last four years has been its move from traditional ad retargeting to establishing itself as a \u201ccommerce media platform\u201d focusing on retail media. <\/p>\n

The pivot was aimed to strengthening relationships with agency holding groups and included major acquisitions, such as retail media tech firm Mabaya and ad tech company IPONWEB for $380 million<\/a>. This move bolstered Criteo\u2019s capabilities, particularly in providing solutions that integrate with agencies preferred demand-side platforms. <\/p>\n

Criteo\u2019s burgeoning relationship with holding company agencies \u201cat a platform level\u201d was a key message company executives tried to impress upon financial analysts, with some observing how its choice of new CEO former Dentsu Americas chief Komasinski as a ploy to further its relationship with such powerbrokers. <\/p>\n

However, it also faces stiff competition from Amazon, which is aggressively expanding its advertising business and targeting Madison Avenue\u2019s top media buyers with its Retail Ads Service posing a direct threat to Criteo\u2019s retail media ambitions, according to some.<\/p>\n

Criteo executives can counter with how it has brokered a significant relationship with Microsoft Advertising<\/a>, itself a significant player in the Big Tech-dominated ad tech landscape, but another major area of continuity between Clarken and Komasinski\u2019s tenure (he takes over on Feb. 16) will be the transition to a cookie-less world<\/a>. This sector of the industry landscape is as uncertain as ever, especially following Google\u2019s announcement\/non-announcement<\/a> in this regard at the 2025 IAB annual leadership meeting, although, Criteo\u2019s engineering teams<\/a> will continue to be a prominent voice in any Privacy Sandbox third-party discussions.<\/p>\n

However, given the ongoing wave of mergers and acquisitions in the sector, not to mention ongoing chatter regarding Criteo as a potential target of a bigger fish in the pond<\/a>, some wonder if the sale of Criteo to Microsoft could be the denouement of Criteo\u2019s time on the public markets and Microsoft\u2019s own resurgent ambitions in adland.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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https:\/\/digiday.com\/?p=567897<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\n More in Media Buying<\/span>
\n <\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ronan Shields \u00a0\u2022\u00a0 February 5, 2025 \u00a0\u2022 Ivy Liu Criteo\u2019s latest earnings call represented the passing of the baton between outgoing chief executive Megan Clarken, and its incoming CEO Michael Komasinkski, with the former of the pair underlining the overhaul that marked her four-year term of office. \u201cWe no longer plan our business around<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":830556,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39587,98468],"tags":[43884,127775],"class_list":{"0":"post-830555","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-we","8":"category-criteo","9":"tag-we","10":"tag-criteo"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=830555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/830556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=830555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=830555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=830555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}