As part of the requirement to be a part of the Inc magazine 500/5000 list, several ad ecosystem companies have released their revenues for 2010 as well as provided overall headcount.Disclaimer: These are not audited results.
- Hubspot - $15.6 million (179 employees = $87,150 per employee)
- Spongecell - $3.8 million (25 employees = $152,000 per employee)
- Millenial Media - $47.8 million (162 employees = $295,061 per employee)
- Yext - $23.4 million (85 employees = $275,294 per employee)
- myBuys had $9.4 million (87 employees = $108,045 per employee)
- Clearspring - $6.3 million (47 employees = $134,042 per employee)
- Collective - $100.2 million (182 employees = $550,549 per employee)
- TRAFFIQ - $9.1 million (42 employees = $216,666 per employee)
- Rockfish Interactive - $14.1 million (recently acquired by WPP Group) (120 employees = $117,500 per employee)
- OneScreen - $2.2 million (30 employees = $73,333 per employee)
- mediaFORGE, $2.1 million (17 employees = $123,529 per employee)
It's hard to make any overall assumptions here, but if you did, you'd note that the ad network model-related companies are out in front in terms of revenues and revenue per employee in 2010.
In terms of a benchmark among the publicly-traded competition, Aol recorded approximately $334 million in 2010 revenues for its Ad.com ("Third Party Network" as Aol calls it in its earnings releases) unit.
Private companies have staked out their revenue turf in press releases, too, as personalized retargeting firm Criteo said in July that it had made $200 million in three years (PDF).
By John Ebbert
Do they break out gross billings or revenue? Ad networks have high gross billings, but revenue numbers (post rev share) are typically 30-60% lower. Which is why ad networks buying in the spot markets is so attractive (keep the 30-60% fee).
Click any of the links to each company's numbers and you'll find what Inc. supplies. Hard to say they're gross or net. Good point.
Interesting numbers! Obviously a lot of these are not apples to apples, since the industries are totally different. For instance, HubSpot is a software as a service company (SaaS) and much more comparable to Salesforce.com or NetSuite than any of the companies on this list. And as a SaaS company, the vast majority of your revenue is recurring, which public and private investors value highly because of the stability. My understanding OS that most ad networks have less revenue stability because customers are not under long term contracts and the ad network is not like software that is a critical part of their internal business process.