Mediaocean has acquired Invision, a software company that helps broadcasters and major media companies manage sales workflow. The financial terms of the deal, announced Thursday, were undisclosed and Mediaocean expects to add 100-plus employees as a result of the transaction. This deal represents Mediaocean’s first serious foray into sell-side tools, since it had previously focused […]
While the VC well has runneth dry for many of the middlemen of ad tech, the cash is still flowing for companies focused on the cross-device space, mar tech, artificial intelligence and mobile marketing automation. Flowing with caveats, however. “It’s not that capital has dried up, but rather that investors are being more deliberate in […]
Parsec, an ad network that creates what it calls “politely interruptive” ad experiences, raised $1.5 million in seed funding on Wednesday from a slew of big-name backers in the ad space. Some of those investors include Jonah Goodhart, the CEO of Moat, who made his contribution by way of early stage capital investor group WGI; […]
Marketing automation giant Marketo has been snapped up by a private equity buyer in a deal that values it among the top ad and marketing tech investments ever. Vista Equity Partners, which took a majority investment in agency billing and workflow software Mediaocean last June, agreed to acquire Marketo in a $1.79 billion all-cash deal. Upon […]
When it last reported its quarterly earnings, LinkedIn revealed to the world that it would sunset Lead Accelerator, the B2B lead-nurturing product it inherited from the $175 million Bizo acquisition. The remnants would be fed into its Sponsored Content offering – which has developed into a major growth area. Sponsored Content has continued to benefit […]
Demand-side platform Turn on Thursday revealed a $15 million round of funding, bringing its total raised since 2005 to $152.5 million. There was no lead in this latest round as all of Turn’s current investors participated. The new round is Turn’s first in CEO Bruce Falck’s tenure, and it’s notably more modest than the $80 […]
Canadian video ad platform SourceKnowledge has closed $1.5 million in mezzanine financing from BDC Capital that it will use for product development and building out its West Coast operations. The Montreal-based company, which was founded in 2009, is profitable and was largely bootstrapped until now, so it wished to remain modest by taking a mezzanine […]
The telco industry’s obsession with ad tech shows no sign of slowing down and Verizon’s corporate venture arm is the latest accelerant. Verizon Ventures has invested $5.5 million in Qualia, a company focused on mining intent data, and which recently merged with cross-device tool BlueCava. The Series B round included support from S3 Ventures. It’s […]
Nielsen is increasing its ownership stake in Nielsen Catalina Solutions (NCS) – its joint venture with shopper marketing company Catalina – from 50% to a majority 63.5%. Nielsen Catalina connects TV viewing and digital ad exposure to in-store buying, which Nielsen claims perfectly aligned with its business strategy. “Helping clients find the right audiences and […]
Neustar’s marketing services revenue grew 23% to $51.1 million YoY in the fourth quarter, and climbed 16% to $170.4 million for the full year 2015. It’s a small but increasingly important part of Neustar’s overall business (which also includes information services and security services). According to CEO Lisa Hook the total business brought in $1.05 billion in […]
Comcast is losing fewer cable TV customers than it has in the past eight years. That’s no small feat, considering signs of rampant cord cutting inundating the broadcast industry. Comcast added 89,000 customers for video service Xfinity in the fourth quarter, the most of any quarter since 2006, according to its earnings release. Video revenue […]
Google had a strong showing in Q4, its first quarter airing results under an entirely new segment-based reporting structure. Google’s holding company Alphabet reported $21.3 billion in Q4 2015 revenue, an 18% increase YoY. Google itself saw $21.2 billion in quarterly revenue (an 18% YoY increase) and $74.5 billion for FY 2015. Read the release. Breaking down the […]
The British broadcaster Sky Media on Monday announced a $10 million investment in the DSP and DMP provider DataXu. Sky hopes the relationship will help it better understand programmatic advertising, said Jamie West, Sky Media’s deputy managing director, in a release. “The money substantiates the belief in each other’s companies,” said DataXu CRO Ed Montes […]
2015 wasn’t the best time for an ad tech company to tap the public markets. And 2016 seems like it will be equally uncertain – one need only look at the strange ongoing saga of AppNexus to see that. But it’s an overstatement to say that all ad tech companies are in trouble, according to […]
AppNexus’ management and investors have spent the better part of a year preparing to take the company public. But the harsh (and getting harsher) IPO climate means they might not get to realize that ambition any time soon. As a result, even while AppNexus remains poised for a public offering – and could in fact […]
If 2014 was a year of big buys in ad tech, 2015 seemed more muted. While 2014 saw a run on attribution companies from big players like Google and AOL, massive consolidation among data management platforms and some big splashes from Oracle and Alliance Data Services, 2015 was about the quiet private equity exit. Sure, […]
German entertainment media network RTL Group has led a $15 million Series A investment in VideoAmp, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based startup focused on helping buyers plan, purchase and measure unduplicated audiences across mobile, over-the-top TV, video on demand and so on. Other investors include Anthem Venture Partners, Simon Equity Partners and Third Wave Capital. Prior to […]
Criteo is prepping a Universal Match product as a serious contender in the cross-device arms race. The company is pooling anonymized data from two-thirds of its 9,300 brand customers in its consumer database. Every brand that participates provides CRM data (not unlike Google’s Customer Match) that would enable them to target specific users cross-platform through […]
Ensighten has raised $53 million in debt and equity financing to push beyond its core tag management system. Existing investor Insight Venture Partners and others led the Series C round, with participation from Silicon Valley Bank. The injection will be used for product development, continuing to expand its global leadership team and to ramp up […]
StrongView on Thursday merged with marketing automation system Selligent. Private equity firm HGGC owns majority stakes in both companies. As a combined company, Belgium-based Selligent and Redwood City, Calif.-based StrongView will employ about 350 people. The goal is to expand products and services internationally, said Selligent co-founder and CEO André Lejeune. Lejeune will serve as […]
There’s apparently power in numbers in the fight against ratings fixture Nielsen. Measurement companies comScore and Rentrak have reached a definitive agreement to merge, the two companies announced Tuesday. (press release) In the stock-for-stock merger, Rentrak is to merge into a wholly owned subsidiary of comScore. ComScore CEO Serge Matta will take the reins as CEO […]
Social marketing platform Unified, an early Facebook and Instagram ads partner, has raised $30 million in Series B financing and an additional $10 million credit facility, the company said Thursday. IHeartMedia led the Series B round with support from existing investors, including Advance Publications, Upfront Ventures and Foundry Group. Silicon Valley Bank, provided the credit […]
NewsCred, a maker of content marketing software for enterprise brands like Barclays, Toyota and Conair, has raised $42 million in growth equity led by FTV Capital – bringing its total to $88.8 million. NewsCred’s co-founder and CEO, Shafqat Islam, has voiced concerns in the past regarding oversaturation in the content marketing technology category, citing $100 million […]
Last week’s stock market dip and subsequent recovery could have particularly troublesome consequence for ad tech firms looking to play on public markets. Though market volatility is a constant, last week’s flux put a spotlight on a handful of ad tech firms often mentioned as IPO candidates, among them AppNexus, Quantcast, Collective, Dstillery, PubMatic, Integral Ad Science, […]
Sizmek has gone through some seismic changes to its sales staff and some of its product offerings. So despite a 9% YoY decline in Q2 revenue to $40.2 million, CEO Neil Nguyen’s word to investors during Sizmek’s earnings call Wednesday was: “Look for efforts to match our results in the second half of the year and even more […]
Despite Alibaba’s 28% revenue growth to $3.2 billion in Q1, the Chinese ecommerce giant experienced its slowest growth rate in sales over the last three years. This stall might be partially attributed to growing pains as Chinese consumers move from desktop to mobile. Alibaba’s total gross merchandise volume rose 34% to $108 billion (compared to […]
Video demand-side platform TubeMogul reported that more than 20% of global spend running through its platform in the second quarter came from mobile, programmatic TV and display ad formats. Mobile ad spend drove 10-15% of spend, programmatic TV constituted between 5-10% and less than 5% came from display. “We think this is significant, given our […]
Though video ad company YuMe held to last quarter’s promise that it would release a programmatic ad stack, it did little to improve its Q2 2015 financial performance. “We had a disappointing quarter,” said Jayant Kadambi, co-founder and CEO during a Monday earnings call. YuMe’s Q2 2015 revenue was flat – $40.4 million in Q2 2015, […]
French performance marketing company Criteo turned in a solid second quarter, growing its revenue ex-TAC by 65% to €110 million (US$120 million), up from €67 million (US$73 million) last year. Criteo continued its client growth streak, adding 730 net new advertiser clients in the last quarter to total about 8,500. It claims those clients are spending more, too, resulting […]
Media quality verification company Integral Ad Science revealed Friday a new $67 million investment. The round is a mix of debt and equity financing, which CEO Scott Knoll described as an “optimal” blend for the 6-year-old company. Knoll also said the company’s revenue will surpass $100 million this year. The company had raised about $49.8 […]
