At an investor day in April, CEO Mark Penn introduced that Stagwell was testing a partnership with Palantir to discover whether or not the controversial AI agency’s know-how can enhance efficiency media focusing on.
On Stagwell’s second quarter earnings name final week, Penn elaborated barely on the partnership, telling traders that the businesses are working to “develop state-of-the-art knowledge focusing on” know-how inside Stagwell’s ID Graph, leveraging structured and unstructured knowledge from throughout its community.
In an interview with ADWEEK following the earnings name, Penn defined how Stagwell is testing Palantir’s AI on its inner knowledge platforms equivalent to BERA, an AI-powered model insights platform that conducts 50,000 client interviews weekly, and advertising analysis agency Nationwide Analysis Group (NRG), which tracks leisure and media habits. That knowledge is then fed into techniques like Stage, Meeting’s media planning and shopping for platform, to gasoline higher media outcomes.
“How do they take our structured and unstructured knowledge and enhance the focusing on out of that?” Penn mentioned of Palantir.
Penn mentioned Stagwell is piloting the know-how with a single consumer for now and can assess a broader rollout from there. He described the collaboration as a managed trial: “You get a profitable drug, and then you definitely go to market.”
Whereas Palantir’s AI is presently being examined inside Stage, its integration into Stagwell’s broader ID Graph system has not but begun—although that’s the last word aim. “If they will [enhance targeting], we’ll then focus on how you can take the partnership to a different degree,” Penn mentioned.
The collaboration started roughly three months in the past and is being led by a brand new cross-agency tech crew at Stagwell, which incorporates current rent Slavi Samardzija, the previous CEO of Omnicom’s Annalect and one of many architects of its Omni platform, alongside chief AI officer John Kahan, former Accenture govt Mansoor Basha, and former Microsoft exec Elspeth Rollert.
Individually, Stagwell is growing an AI platform referred to as The Machine, which centralizes and automates workflows and content material creation and permits groups to observe efficiency in the identical interface. Penn mentioned the long-term aim is to permit shoppers to question marketing campaign efficiency, timelines, and artistic property immediately by way of the platform.
A Polarizing Accomplice
Palantir is finest recognized for its authorities work—together with its contracts with the U.S. Division of Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the Inner Income Service (IRS). Its reported involvement in building a centralized “mega-database” of sensitive U.S. citizen information under the Trump Administration has drawn scrutiny from lawmakers over potential privateness violations.
The agency additionally works with business shoppers together with Airbus, BP, Merck, and Ferrari, serving to them combine knowledge to optimize operations—although its authorities enterprise stays nearly all of its income.
Palantir’s in depth position in surveillance and legislation enforcement has made the corporate a lightning rod in debates over the usage of military-grade AI in business settings. On Stagwell’s Q1 earnings name in March, Penn described the trouble as “growing superior military-grade focusing on to reinforce the utilization of Stagwell’s distinctive datasets.”
