Possible delay of Publicis Omnicom Merger until Q2

The completion of the Publicis Omnicom merger may be pushed back into the second quarter of next year, a delay from the first-quarter close originally planned when the transaction was announced in July.Publicis Omnicom Group co-chief executive officers Maurice Lévy and John Wren made that announcement at a Morgan Stanley technology, media and telecoms conference in Barcelona this week, according to reports from Bloomberg and Reuters.Reuters said the merger, which will create the industry’s largest company with $23 billion in revenue, will close, at the latest, by the first half of 2014. The news service said Lévy and Wren blamed the delay on some pending regulatory approvals including those in Russia and the European Union.“We’ll close certainly in the first half and as early as we can,” Wren told conference attendees, Reuters reported.*Pictured - Publicis chief Maurice LevyArticle from Adweek