Today’s digest covers OpenAI testing an Ads Manager and preparing its Agentic Storefronts feature, Meta being expelled from IAB Sweden while it plans major staff layoffs, and TikTok investors facing a huge bill from the Trump Administration. 

OpenAI tests Ads Manager and prepares Agentic Storefronts feature 

As OpenAI’s trial of ads on ChatGPT pushes forward, the company has begun to test an Ads Manager with a small group of partners, a spokesperson told AdWeek. The Ads Manager allows advertisers to run, monitor, and optimise their campaigns in real-time through a dashboard. The collection of feedback is ongoing. Those involved in the current testing are receiving weekly reports detailing performance data such as clicks and impressions.  

Additionally, ChatGPT’s Agentic Storefronts feature will soon allow the discoverability and purchase of Shopify merchants’ products. Shopify sent an email to its merchants sharing that the update would arrive later this month. The announcement read: “Buyers can find your products and complete purchases inside ChatGPT. This agentic storefront channel will launch by default for your store”. 

An earlier partnership between OpenAI and Shopify allowed buyers to complete purchases through Instant Checkout, a native checkout experience allowing users to buy products directly within the chatbot. The new system will still display merchants’ products within conversations on ChatGPT, but buyers will typically complete purchases on merchants’ own storefronts. An OpenAI spokesperson commented that the company is evolving their approach to commerce to “better meet merchants and users where they are”. 

Publishers back Meta’s expulsion from IAB Sweden as it plans sweeping layoffs 

Three of Sweden’s largest media groups, Aller Media, Bonnier News, and Schibsted, have endorsed Meta’s expulsion from IAB Sweden over its fraudulent ads and insufficient efforts to tackle them. The banishment, formalised last week at an emergency meeting, was initiated by Bonnier News and Schibsted, with Aller Media supporting it. 

The publishers called the move necessary and long overdue. Joakim Flodin, CEO of Schibsted Marketing Services, said “We cannot be part of an organisation that allows a company like Meta to be a member, while the company earns an estimated SEK 136bn [£10.8bn] from fraudulent ads and advertising for prohibited products… This is a matter of fundamental principles and responsibility towards our readers, users, and customers.” 

As this unfolds, IAB UK has reaffirmed Meta’s membership in the region. An IAB spokesperson justified the decision, telling the Media Leader that the industry body’s aim is “to work with the broadest possible membership to help make digital advertising better for everyone and address shared industry challenges.” 

Meanwhile, Meta prepares for sweeping layoffs which could affect almost a quarter of the company, according to people familiar with the matter. There are no dates set for these yet, and the severity of the workforce cuts have not been fully decided. The move would come as Meta seeks to offset the costs of its AI infrastructure. 

TikTok faces $10bn bill from Trump Administration 

TikTok’s US investors are set to pay a sum of USD$10bn (£7.5bn) to the US Treasury, a fee which the government is charging as a transaction fee for its role in helping separate its US operations from its Chinese parent company ByteDance. 

Investors, who include software giant Oracle as well as investments firms Silver Lake and Emirati, already paid the Treasury around USD$2.5bn (£1.8bn) back in January after the deal closed. President Trump previously commented that there would be a “tremendous fee” to be paid for putting the deal together. “I call it a fee plus for just making the deal,” he said.

Aaron Bartnick, a former White House assistant director for a technology department under the Biden administration, called the sum “outrageously large”.