Read all about it. It’s official today – Publicis has acquired Razorfish for $530 million: Bloomberg, Agence France Presse, The Wall Street Journal, Publicis release (PDF en Francais), and The New York Times.
According to Bloomberg, “Razorfish will continue to operate under its own name, and will remain Microsoft’s ‘agency of record’ for online advertising and marketing, the companies said in a joint statement.”
As expected, Microsoft Advertising services will be part of the deal as AFP notes, “Publicis also said in its statement that it would be boosting the global strategic partnership with Microsoft it had announced in June to develop online advertising.”
Digitas, which was bought a little over two years ago by Publicis, and Razorfish will now be under the same VivaKi umbrella according to the Publicis release. It will be interesting to see how Razorfish’s Atom-ic, digital strategy efforts will be merged – or not – with the VivaKi Nerve Center.
The deal is to close at the end of the year.