MAM
Adspend: Twitter fastest growing, FB & Google control 20%
MUMBAI: Google and Facebook together accounted for 20% of global advertising expenditure across all media in 2016, up from 11% in 2012, according to the new edition of Zenith’s Top Thirty Global Media Owners. These two companies captured 64% of all the growth in global adspend between 2012 and 2016.
The Top Thirty Global Media Owners report is Zenith’s unique ranking of the world’s largest media companies, and is being published since 2007. For this edition, it has decided to update its methodology and focus purely on media owners’ revenues from advertising, excluding revenues from all other activities, which gives the true measure of their status in the global advertising market.
Google (under its holding company Alphabet) is by some distance the largest media owner in the world, attracting US$79.4bn in ad revenue in 2016, three times more than the second-largest – Facebook – which attracted US$26.9bn. The largest traditional media owner is Comcast, which takes third place in our ranking, with US$12.9bn in ad revenue.
As we stated in our quarterly Advertising Expenditure Forecasts, internet advertising has overtaken television to become the world’s largest advertising medium this year. Accordingly, digital platforms that are funded by internet advertising dominate our top 30 ranking. As well as Alphabet and Facebook, there are five more pure-internet media owners in the top 30: Baidu, Microsoft, Yahoo, Verizon and Twitter. Between them, the seven digital platforms generated US$132.8bn in internet ad revenue in 2016 – that’s 73% of all internet adspend, and 24% of global adspend across all media.
Verizon became a media owner in 2015 when it bought AOL, and if all goes to plan will become a much larger one when it acquires Yahoo later this year. Verizon takes 21st place in our current ranking; adding Yahoo to AOL would boost it to sixth.
The fastest-growing media owner in our list is Twitter, which increased its ad revenues by 734% between 2012 and 2016. Tencent is second, having grown by 697% over this period, and Facebook is third, with 528% growth. Two other media owners have more than doubled in size between 2012 and 2016: Baidu, which grew 190%, and Sinclair Broadcasting Group, which grew 171%.
Most of the media owners in our ranking – 20 out of 30 – are based in the US. The US dominates for several reasons: the US has the biggest ad market, US companies have invested the most in extending their reach abroad, and Silicon Valley innovation has powered the growth of internet advertising. China and Germany each have three media owners in the ranking (Baidu, Tencent and CCTV for China, and Bertelsmann, ProSiebenSat.1 and Axel Springer for Germany). Then there are four countries with one media owners each: France (JCDecaux), Brazil (Grupo Globo), Italy (Mediaset) and the UK (ITV).
“The scale of the biggest platforms highlights the importance of building strong partnerships between agencies and media owners,” said Vittorio Bonori, Zenith’s Global Brand President. “Brands need to deal with these platforms to communicate with consumers effectively and efficiently, and agencies need to ensure they do so on the best terms available.”
“Zenith’s new ranking demonstrates just how much the internet advertising platforms are setting the pace for global adspend growth,” said Jonathan Barnard, Head of Forecasting at Zenith. “Google and Facebook alone have accounted for almost two thirds of global adspend growth since 2012.”
Ranking of Top 30 Global Media Owners 2017
Brands
Ola Electric revenue falls, losses continue in December quarter
Company cuts expenses and seeks fresh funds as sales slow and regulators raise questions.
MUMBAI: It seems Ola Electric is currently navigating a bit of a patchy connection, and we are not just talking about a dropped Bluetooth sync on the dashboard. The electric vehicle (EV) giant’s latest financial results for the quarter ended 31 December 2025 have hit the wires, and the numbers are looking more short circuit than supercharged.
The company’s consolidated revenue from operations for the December quarter came in at Rs 470 crore, a significant deceleration from the Rs 690 crore recorded in the preceding quarter. The comparison to the same period last year is even more stark, when revenue stood at a much loftier Rs 1,045 crore. Despite a small recharge of Rs 18 crore from previously unclaimed government subsidies under the EMP5-2024 and PM E-Drive schemes, the overall income trajectory has clearly lost its torque.
Total income for the quarter stood at Rs 504 crore, while the bottom line remained firmly in the red, with a quarterly loss of Rs 487 crore. For the nine-month period ending December 2025, the total accumulated loss has now ballooned to a staggering Rs 1,333 crore.
In an effort to keep the wheels from falling off, Ola has been aggressively downshifting its expenditure. Total expenses for the quarter were slashed to Rs 741 crore, a massive drop from the Rs 1,505 crore spent during the same quarter the previous year.
This belt-tightening suggests a pivot toward leaner operations as the company attempts to find a sustainable cruising speed. However, even with these deep cuts, the going concern tag is being sustained largely by Rs 1,503 crore in remaining IPO proceeds, along with a fresh shareholder approval to raise another Rs 1,500 crore through equity or convertible securities.
The National Stock Exchange (NSE) and SEBI have also been examining the matter closely, questioning why Ola’s press claims did not align with official Vahan portal data. The company had earlier announced 25,000 units sold in February 2025, but has now clarified to regulators that this figure referred to vehicle bookings rather than final registrations. Under Ola’s accounting policy, a sale is recognised only once the scooter is delivered and registered. Management maintains that this clarification will not have a material impact on the financials, although it has certainly raised eyebrows in the market.
The group’s cash flow situation remains under pressure. For the nine months ended 31 December 2025, Ola reported a negative cash flow from operations of Rs 866 crore, attributing it primarily to lower-than-expected growth in sales volume.
Adding to the complexity are the new Labour Codes. The company has already factored in an additional Rs 5.06 crore in liabilities due to changes in wage definitions affecting gratuity. Meanwhile, the Cell segment, which represents Ola’s major bet on battery manufacturing, is still at an early stage. It contributed just Rs 9 crore to revenue, compared to Rs 407 crore from the automotive segment.
As Ola attempts to navigate this financial fog, the message is clear: the road to an electric future is paved with expensive ambitions. For now, the company is applying the brakes to avoid a deeper skid.
