In March, Publicis Groupe and demand-side platform The Trade Desk got into a very public spat over allegations by the holding company of contract violations, hidden fees and other alleged transparency issues.  

Publicis Groupe also asserted that TTD failed an audit commissioned by FirmDecisions -- and as a result, could no longer recommend that clients use TTD’s services.   

TTD denied all of Publicis’ allegations and said it looked forward to working with Publicis to resolve the dispute. 

It seems the issue has now been resolved. The companies issued a joint statement to another publication that said little other than that the dispute was settled, and that Publicis was now recommending TTD to clients again.  

A Publicis rep declined further comment, and a TTD spokesperson did not return a query seeking more information on the matter.   

The contretemps sparked a lot of industry discussion. For one, ID Comms devoted an edition of its podcast with CEO Tom Denford and Chief Client Officer David Indo to the matter. They said the spat raised an opportunity for marketers to “quantify exposure, close governance gaps, and convert non-working programmatic spend back into working media value.”  

They laid out multiple steps for marketers to take, which can be reviewed here.