{"id":21321,"date":"2026-11-09T01:09:00","date_gmt":"2026-11-09T06:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/advertisingweek.com\/aw360\/?p=21321"},"modified":"2026-11-08T16:11:40","modified_gmt":"2026-11-08T21:11:40","slug":"why-independent-agencies-are-moving-ahead-in-the-programmatic-race-qa-with-mint-square-ceo-christoph-berg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/advertisingweek.com\/aw360\/news\/why-independent-agencies-are-moving-ahead-in-the-programmatic-race-qa-with-mint-square-ceo-christoph-berg\/21321\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Independent Agencies Are Moving Ahead in the Programmatic Race \u2013 Q&amp;A With Mint Square CEO Christoph Berg"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>By R. Larsson, Advertising Week<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>We sat down with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/christophberg\/?locale=de\">Christoph Berg<\/a>, CEO of <a href=\"https:\/\/mint-square.com\/en\/\">MINT Square<\/a>, to talk about the changing balance of power in the advertising industry, and why accessible programmatic technology is the key to independent agencies thriving in the next era of competition.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Q: You&#8217;ve recently noted that we are entering a new era of agency competition, with independent agencies increasingly winning major accounts away from traditional holdcos. What is driving this shift, and how are indie teams capitalising on it?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Brands have got tired of waiting. For years the assumption was that scale was a proxy for sophistication: if you wanted access to advanced technology, data and sophisticated media buying, you went to a holding company. That model still has clear advantages, but scale is no longer the differentiator it once was. Independent agencies are increasingly proving that smaller teams can offer the same level of sophistication while operating with greater flexibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They work differently. The strategist who wins the account is often the same person managing the campaign three weeks in, so the client is talking to someone who actually knows their business. This intimacy counts for more now that brands are investing in their own in-house capabilities and want a close relationship with the agencies helping deliver their vision. The pressure to prove ROI reinforces it, because a leaner team is easier to justify; the client knows the names and faces behind the work rather than seeing a department reduced to a line item. Speed and cost transparency also help, giving teams once dismissed as too small for enterprise accounts the ability to compete on equal terms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Q: While independent agencies have an advantage in agility, holdcos still maintain a lead in proprietary data platforms and cross-channel activation. How can indies overcome the financial and operational challenges of fragmented supply chains to compete globally?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It&#8217;s true that agility wins pitches, but it doesn&#8217;t close the technology divide on its own. Holding companies have spent years and enormous sums building proprietary stacks, recently bolstered by high-profile acquisitions, and an independent agency cannot replicate that \u2013 nor should they try to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The answer is to bundle this complexity into a single point of access. Rather than stitching together direct contracts with each platform, an agency can reach top-tier tools through one partner that handles the commercial thresholds and the onboarding as well as the ongoing support. At MINT Square we give agencies direct access to platforms like The Trade Desk, Adform, and Active Agent through one membership, so a lean team can activate globally without carrying the weight of a dozen separate vendor relationships. Access, rather than ownership, is what indies need to compete at scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Q: As the programmatic landscape continues to expand into environments such as digital out-of-home, the barrier to entry can seem daunting. How do independent agencies scale their capabilities in these emerging, high-impact channels?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Programmatic digital out-of-home (pDOOH) should be a natural fit for independent agencies, because the medium rewards exactly the qualities they have. It is one of the most flexible formats in media. Campaigns can respond to phenomena such as local weather and traffic flows, creative can be refreshed within the day, and budgets can be reallocated by location in near real time. This responsiveness suits a team that can make a decision without having to go through several layers of internal bureaucracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The challenge has been less about whether independent agencies can use pDOOH effectively, and more about how easily they can participate in the market.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A once-simple buying process has grown into a tangle of platforms, intermediaries, and commercial arrangements, and premium inventory often comes attached to long contracts or minimum spend commitments that favour scale over flexibility. For an agency running shorter campaigns or juggling variable client budgets, these terms can be genuinely prohibitive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The way forward is open, interoperable infrastructure that lets an agency reach quality screen inventory without committing to a closed, single-vendor environment. When pDOOH runs through the same DSPs a team already uses for display and video, there is no separate system to learn, and the agency can quickly build an omnichannel plan that carries a brand from mobile to large-format screens. Better access raises the level of sophistication on offer, because it frees the agency to focus on strategy rather than plumbing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Q: It\u2019s been argued that excessive consolidation leads to stagnant innovation and that the industry needs independent technology. What does a successful, modular technology stack look like for an agency that wants top-tier capabilities without being locked into a single, proprietary ecosystem?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When a handful of companies own both the media and the technology used to buy it, the incentive to keep improving weakens. You can see the consequences across digital advertising, where interoperability is declining as the largest players build isolated environments around their own supply chains. Independent technology is a counterbalance, keeping the ecosystem competitive by giving agencies real choice about which tools they use and when.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In practice, a modular setup means the agency assembles its stack from best-in-class components and can change any one of them without having to dismantle the rest. Say, for example, a client&#8217;s priorities move toward CTV, or a new measurement provider proves to be more accurate in a particular market. A modular agency swaps in that element and carries on, while an agency tied to a single proprietary suite has to accept whatever that suite offers, even where the tools have become obsolete or underperform. This flexibility offers resilience too, because a team working across several platforms can optimise costs and adjust quickly while staying free of vendor lock-in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Q: With AI rapidly compressing production timelines and automating tasks, the playing field is changing again. How do you see AI tools and unified programmatic frameworks empowering independent agencies in the years to come?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AI is a great equaliser for small teams. Work that used to require considerable resource, such as building creative variants, repurposing assets for a new format, or analysing performance data, can now be done in a few clicks by a five-person agency as easily as a 5,000-person one. That reduces the operational advantage that once came from simply having more people available to solve a problem.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The bigger shift will come as AI moves from assisting individual tasks to coordinating execution across a unified programmatic framework.&nbsp; When tools are scattered across disconnected platforms, AI can only optimise within each silo. When activation runs through a connected framework, agents can increasingly support campaign setup, activation, monitoring and optimisation across channels, while strategic planning remains firmly guided by people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For independent agencies, that creates an opportunity to turn agility into a much more powerful competitive advantage. With open, interoperable foundations in place, they can react faster, make better use of data and spend more of their time on strategy rather than execution. The agencies that adapt early will be in a much stronger position as programmatic buying becomes increasingly automated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We sat down with Christoph Berg, CEO of MINT Square, to talk about the changing balance of power in the advertising industry, and why accessible programmatic technology is the key to independent agencies thriving in the next era of competition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":21322,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[6],"topics":[2],"class_list":["post-21321","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-tech","topics-editorial"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v28.5 (Yoast SEO v28.5) - 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