Dentsu tops Ireland’s new business table with €14.7m. Heineken and Netflix did most of it

Dentsu booked €14.7m of net new business in Ireland in the first half of 2026. That is more than the next two groups put together. AdWorld reported the figures on 25 September 2026, from the COMvergence New Business Barometer. WPP Media came second with €5.5m.

Core and Omnicom Media tied for third on €2.6m each. Below the group level the table looks different again.

Red Star took €10.4m, more than any other Irish agency

Red Star, part of Dentsu, led the agency table with €10.4m. iProspect followed on €4.8m, Mindshare on €4.5m, PHD on €2.6m and Spark Foundry Ireland on €1.9m. Two Dentsu agencies therefore hold the top two places.

Heineken and Netflix account for most of Dentsu’s half

Heineken moved €10.4m of billings to Red Star. Netflix moved €4.8m to iProspect. Both are global decisions that landed in Dublin rather than local pitches, and the Netflix side followed the group taking the streaming account across 22 markets. WPP Media picked up Jaguar Land Rover at €2.1m and Just Eat at €1.7m. Allianz Health and Life put €2.8m into review.

Olivier Gauthier points at the holding groups’ central units

The COMvergence chief said centralised holding group operations took 26 percent of reviewed spend worldwide, worth $5.0bn of $19.2bn. The firm tracked 1,970 account moves in 49 countries, a figure 9 percent higher than a year earlier. MediaPost published those global numbers on 22 September. They sit alongside the group-level totals reported earlier this month.

Ireland moves a fraction of the billings that Britain does

Ireland books a fraction of the spend that moves in Britain or Germany. One international review can therefore reorder the whole table in a single half. That makes local new business figures hard to read as a measure of local sales work.

Heineken alone is worth twice WPP Media’s whole half

Heineken alone is worth €10.4m, roughly twice what WPP Media booked in Ireland across the whole half. Dentsu’s net figure for the six months is €14.7m. An agency chasing Dublin briefs is working in a market where one account can outweigh a year of steady smaller wins.