Eye on mergers: Media behemoths up agency ante;CBS-Viacom deal gets FCC's OK, raises questions about consolidation.(Brief Article)

Advertising Age,  May, 2000  by Linnett, Richard; Teinowitz, Ira

Tags: agency, consolidation, FCC, merger

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Viacom's $36 billion purchase of CBS, approved last week by the Federal Communications Commission, could rev up the already hyperspeed pace of recent ad agency media-buying consolidations. But the question is whether the megamergers give agency or media giants the upper hand.

The theory behind the shop consolidations is that bigger communications companies with wide-ranging interests in a variety of media -- such as the CBS/Viacom and Time Warner/AOL pairings -- demand bigger or at least broader-based media-buying agencies to even out the bargaining clout. Those same media ...

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