T-Mobile has held talks to buy Vistar Media

T-Mobile and Vistar Media declined to respond to Digiday’s requests for comment, but later confirmed the deal.

Allen & Company, a boutique investment bank, is considered the representative of the US-based telco. In contrast, LUMA Partners was rumored to be negotiating on behalf of the out-of-home media specialist, although representatives there declined to be involved when Digiday asked them for comment. Representatives of Allen & Co. did not respond to Digiday’s attempts to contact them on LinkedIn.

However, one executive with deep ties to the OOH industry said they had heard a deal was progressing and confirmed T-Mobile as the likely acquirer.

In its recently published analysis of deal closings in 2024, LUMA Partners, which specializes in the ad tech sector, saw an increase in such an activity. “Last year was marked by the return of strategic dialogue in the M&A markets,” he said Full Year Market Report 2024published on January 7. “M&A activity in 2024 is up +13% from a subdued 2023 as Ad Tech (+73%), MarTech (+2%) and Digital Content (+7%) grow year-over-year .”

Founded in 2011, Vistar Media has established itself as a location-based media specialist. It claims to offer a complete marketplace to facilitate transactions between buyers and sellers in the OOH advertising space, including ad server and demand-side and supply-side platforms.

Sources could not provide Digiday with valuation estimates, which those involved in such negotiations can discuss, but the OOH company says its business is “growing.” According to the company, billings for its campaigns increased by 77% year-on-year, supported by a 31% increase in new advertisers over the same period. August 2024 press release — prospectus, which is typical for most sales processes.

“I think you’ll see them doing a number of transactions here. [from T-Mobile] because they are the last man standing in terms of a telco still believing in an advertising opportunity,” said one source, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of such M&A negotiations.

According to official figures at the end of 2024, T-Mobile has more than 127.5 million connections, which it intends to use as a catalyst for its ambitions in the media business, with the completion of any such deal likely to put it at the forefront of the US digital OOH sector, which as the total addressable market is USD 9 billion, per eMarketer estimates.

In separate announcements last year, T-Mobile launched retail media network of stores with more than 20,000 screens across the T-Mobile and Metro by T-Mobile networks and later expanded to connection with Uber’s own advertising division. It was a major advance for its nascent advertising ambitions and enabled it to buy ride-sharing ad network Octopus Interactive in 2022 — financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed — to further boost its footprint in the ad business.

Before approving a merger with (then) telco Sprint in 2020, T-Mobile bought PushSpring for an undisclosed fee, a deal that helped it provide app developers and publishers with audience data to improve ad targeting and in-app push notifications. a development that also saw it start selling media mobile inventory through its T-Life mobile app – representing an audience base of more than 7 million customers.

The deals come under the T-Mobile Advertising Solutions telco, a company with a market capitalization of about $250 billion as of January 2025, which includes former WarnerMedia head of ad sales Jean-Paul Colaco and veteran ad tech executive Mike Peralta. his number. T-Mobile’s continued efforts demonstrate its continued faith in maintaining a remarkable advertising business, and contrasts with telecom rivals such as AT&T and Verizon, which have abandoned similar plans in recent years, largely due to privacy concerns.

Along with significant advances in the development of its advertising services in recent years, T-Mobile has faced significant privacy challenges, including multiple data breaches that have led to regulatory scrutiny and substantial financial settlements.

After the carrier changed its data policies in 2021 to automatically enroll customers in its ad targeting business, the carrier has experienced several high-profile privacy lawsuits that somewhat slowed the acceleration of its ad business, including record fines. For example, a telco agreed to settle $350 million after a hack that compromised its customers’ data — a case that was created again in January 2025 — and in 2024 she agreed to pay $60 million in connection with unauthorized access to data incidents following the decision of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.