JCDecaux acquires a street furniture and outdoor advertising specialist Pisoni, in South of France

A family-owned company created in 1987 by Jean-Pierre Pisoni, it employs 37 staff and currently operates 4,306 advertising panels in the Mediterranean basin, including 2,066 street furniture advertising panels within the framework of public concessions (48% of the portfolio) and 2,240 large format advertising panels in the private sector (52% of the portfolio). Pisoni also offers digital printing services via its company Tendance Pixxl.

Pisoni is the reference company in the south of France, a region that is renowned for its economic strength which exceeds the French average and which benefits from busy tourist traffic. Its assets are located in six departments – Alpes-Maritimes, Hérault, Var, Drôme, Bouches-du-Rhône, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence – and it has four local branches in Mouans-Sartoux, Six-Fours, Saint-Jean-de-Védas and Valence.

As a player with strong local links, JCDecaux has partnerships in over 1000 ‘communities’ (French regional administrative areas) and thanks to its acquisition of Pisoni is now strengthening its presence in the Mediterranean basin. With its quality assets, Pisoni and JCDecaux share the values of high standards and responsibility and together with the 200+ JCDecaux employees in the region, will work together in the service of cities, advertising partners and people.

This acquisition will also enable JCDecaux to consolidate its national coverage in street furniture within the fragmented and highly competitive French media market. The complementary nature of the JCDecaux and Pisoni assets represents a genuine strength to offer local companies, both regional and national, ever-more efficient analogue and digital display solutions, with development to continue in line with a qualitative approach that monitors energy consumption, for both short and long-term campaigns (representing 50% of Pisoni’s revenue in 2021).

Fully aware of the societal challenges faced today, Pisoni has adopted a sustainable development approach to protect the quality of urban life. The link-up with JCDecaux will enable it to continue to pursue its commitments and to benefit from best practices in terms of ESG.

The acquisition of Pisoni is part of JCDecaux’s external growth strategy aimed at seizing relevant market opportunities as they arise.

Christophe Ulivieri, Chairman of Pisoni, declared: “This deal represents a major turning point for the Pisoni teams, and confirms that our strategy addresses increasing market demand. We immediately hit it off with JCDecaux and found a genuine partner in this family-owned company, in which we have full confidence to continue to write our company’s story. We are delighted and proud to finalise our development projects alongside JCDecaux, which is the expert company in its sector, and we thank Largillière Finance for their excellent assistance in this process”.

Jean-Charles Decaux, Chairman of the Executive Board and Co-CEO of JCDecaux, said: “As a family-owned French company, pioneer of street furniture and leading employer in this sector in France and worldwide, JCDecaux is a reliable and committed partner in the transformation of cities. The link-up with Pisoni, a reference outdoor advertising company in the Mediterranean basin, will enable us to address the service needs of cities and citizens better than ever, as well as the needs of local and national companies in their pursuit of local, efficient, relevant and sustainable communication. We would like to welcome the Pisoni teams to the JCDecaux group, with whom we share the common values of high standards, quality and responsibility.”