LG Teams Up With Arbitrum to Put the $700B Ad Biz On-Chain 📺

LG Electronics has built a blockchain-based advertising platform with the help of Ethereum layer-2 network Arbitrum, the South Korean consumer electronics giant told Fortune on June 11. LG developed its own layer-2 chain through a dedicated blockchain research lab and piloted the system with an unnamed Japanese ad agency. The company said it will evaluate a broader commercial rollout later this year.

The new network is designed to give advertisers and publishers a shared database of ad inventory and to record how audiences interact with each ad placement, replacing much of the manual reconciliation that still settles digital ad deals. "We are evaluating whether this approach can deliver meaningful value to advertisers, publishers and audiences," said Samuel Byungsun Park, head of LG Electronics' blockchain research department. Digital ad spend was estimated at $679 billion in 2025, according to Dentsu, which forecasts $740 billion in 2026, roughly 73% of a global media market projected to surpass $1 trillion for the first time.

Arbitrum cofounder Steven Goldfeder said blockchain rails can automate ad sales without manual intervention. "It means that you can basically run the market in an automated way in software," he said. "You don't need manual intervention." Goldfeder cautioned, however, that launching a dedicated chain is not the right move for every company: "I am very opinionated when someone asks me, 'Should I launch a blockchain?' For many people, the answer is yes, but probably for most people, the answer is no."

The tie-up marks LG's latest Web3 experiment. LG CNS, a subsidiary of LG Corporation, launched an in-house blockchain called "Monachain" in 2018 for digital authentication, payments and supply chain management. LG Electronics later developed a decentralized crypto wallet called Wallypto on Hedera Hashgraph during the 2022 NFT boom to support its LG Art Lab NFT platform; LG Art Lab was shut down in June 2025 and Wallypto was terminated in September 2025.

LG is among a growing list of firms building their own ledgers rather than renting block space. Stripe incubated Tempo, a payments chain that raised $500 million, Robinhood is working with Arbitrum on a tokenized-equity chain, and Circle is developing the Arc network. Arbitrum (ARB) traded near $0.083 on Thursday, gaining 5.44% in 24 hours on the news, yet the token remains down 80% over the past year.