Teads

In this one-on-one interview series, we sit down with top industry experts to unpack the trends, insights, and strategies shaping the future of retail and advertising.

Our guest today is Justin Sparks, GM of Retail and Commerce Media at Teads.

Justin brings a refreshingly skeptical perspective to some of the bigger predictions surrounding AI and shopping.

We talk about the difference between agentic research and agentic purchasing, why the open web may be increasingly important to commerce, how challenger brands can earn their way into AI recommendations, and why brand equity could become more valuable as algorithms play a larger role in product discovery.

I'm so pleased to have you on today.

Richard, great to meet you.

You're GM Retail and Commerce Media at Teads.

Tell us about your role at Teads.

Yeah, Tam.

Um, so then going into the next story, I mean, I think that the, you know, the Teads story's tough.

Um, again, for full, full, full disclosure, I worked at Outbrain.

I was their CMO, uh, before they merged with Teads.

Um, but, like, you look at the contrast of them and Taboola, they've always been these archrivals.

It continues, like, the gap between them continues to, to grow with, with the news that Taboola's now powering, uh, all of NBC, what is it, NBC Universal's, uh, ad inventory, not just the Chumbox ar- ar- area.

Um-

No.

Yeah, I'll see you there, uh, whenever it happens.

Uh, and, and now that there's been a verdict in the federal Google ad tech case, a bunch of ad tech companies, companies that we cover regularly like PubMatic, and Magnite, and OpenX, and Teads, which just put their lawsuit out there in early August, others too, they're filing their own antitrust suits against Google.

Well, I don't know if they're antitrust suits.

Their own suits against Google, arguing that, you know, Google's control of the publisher ad server and ad exchange markets, and Google has already been found guilty of these things, locked them out and cost them business.

It's pretty, not easy, but it's easier to show, "Here's how much Google overcharged." It is harder to show how much market share company X versus company Y would have gotten.

So that's the challenge they're gonna face, but the liability story, I think, is very strong.

And I don't know how they calculated this, but I was scanning the press release about the Teads case from, um, well, the case that they brought at the beginning of August, and they're claiming that they lost like, I don't know, almost seven trillion impressions between 2017 and 2023.

So they're trying to come up with real numbers to point to, like these were trillions of impressions that we weren't able to, you know, handle because of Google's actions.

In 2025, the franchise generated $551 million in total revenue, including $155 million in sponsorships and $110 million in local TV rights.

As Danny Cushon, CMO of Teads, put it, In the record-breaking Lakers deal is another reminder that sport today is much bigger than what happens on the court.

From ownership to media rights, Sportico takes a closer look at why the NFL hasn't locked in early renewals with its broadcast partners and argues it's not a sign of weakness.

The key dynamic is simple.