The global revenue for the British advertising giant WPP in July-September (Q3) increased by 1.4% while LFL (like-for-like) revenue was up by 4.1%.
India was the only country among the top five markets for WPP that registered growth in the mentioned period.
In India, the revenue grew by 2.3% in the July-September quarter, whereas its revenue less pass-through costs for the year-to-date was up 6.2%.
Meanwhile, the UK reported a decline of 1.8% in revenue for the year-to-date, the USA was down by 0.3%, and Germany witnessed a decline of 2.8%.
China, which is considered the fourth largest market for WPP, saw a decline of 20.6% in year-to-date revenue.
Mark Read, Chief Executive Officer of WPP, said, “Our third quarter delivered like-for-like growth in net sales, with a strong performance from GroupM in particular. We saw growth in North America, Western Continental Europe, and India, though trading in China remains difficult.
Most importantly, we returned to form in new business, winning Amazon’s media account outside the Americas and securing our media relationship with Unilever, including taking back the retail media and activation business in the United States. Our success with two of the world’s top ten advertisers demonstrates the renewed competitiveness of our offer. We are also proud to be supporting the new Starbucks leadership team with our recent creative win in the United States.”
Read added, “Our people are increasingly embedding AI in the way that we work and deliver creative and media campaigns to clients, with usage of WPP Open up 107%since the beginning of the year. Supporting this, the creation of VML and Burson, and the simplification of GroupM, are delivering a stronger business and structural cost savings.
We are encouraged by progress during the quarter, but with recent new business wins primarily impacting 2025 and continuing macroeconomic pressures our expectations for the full year remain unchanged.”
Client wins for the agency in Q3 included Amazon (media ex Americas), Unilever (media, retail media and activation, and creative) and Henkel (media).
In Q4, top wins included Starbucks (US creative) and Honor (global media including China).
GroupM grew 4.8% in Q3, offset by a 3.1% decline at other global integrated agencies.
GroupM saw broad-based growth in all major markets, including the US, UK and Germany, partially offset by weakness in China.
“Our integrated creative agencies declined 3.1%. Hogarth continued to grow well, benefiting from new business wins and growing demand for its technology and AI-driven capabilities, as clients seek to produce more personalised and addressable content. Ogilvy grew well in the US, benefiting from recent client assignment wins, but this was offset by weakness in China. VML continued to be impacted by the loss of Pfizer creative assignments, partially offset by growth in spending by automotive and technology clients. AKQA saw continued pressure on project-related work with
macroeconomic uncertainty resulting in more cautious client spend,” it said.