China accounted for more than half of the total global mobile ad spend in Q2 2014. We’ll let that sink in for a moment. From a number like that, it’s little wonder Chinese advertisers and developers are increasing their mobile spend and scaling up their businesses internationally, according to a report released Thursday by app […]
The sad tale of mobile ad exchange Mobclix, which was forced to declare bankruptcy in 2013 after being acquired — and mismanaged — by mobile agency Velti, seems like it could have a happy ending. In November, Mobclix was acquired yet again, re-emerging several months ago as Axonix, a programmatic mobile exchange underpinned by the […]
The cross-device measurement chasm just got a little smaller with the commercial release of mobile ad measurement capabilities, now available as part of Nielsen’s Online Campaign Ratings (OCR) tool. The promise of mobile web and in-app measurement is both an alluring prospect for advertisers looking for a cross-platform view of consumers across digital and TV […]
American Media Inc. (AMI) is turning to Amobee to handle its entire mobile inventory. It’s the biggest traditional print publisher deal in the US yet for SingTel-owned Amobee, which will service AMI’s 40 million unique viewers spanning 18 properties including OK! Magazine, Shape and Men’s Fitness. The mobile-centric ad tech company will provide analytics tools […]
Pre-roll may still be the primary ad unit on offer at Vevo, but the music video platform has an ear out for the sweet sound of mobile ad dollars. And with the launch of a new feed-based app for Android, it’s a strategy that makes sense, especially considering the consumption habits of its predominantly millennial […]
Amazon’s not lifting its foot off the gas pedal in the drive for more developer ad dollars. After revealing the Fire Phone only weeks ago, the ecommerce company tried to incent new app creation via a two-month promotion offering $6 CPMs on the Amazon Mobile Ad Network. The company is also making a European push, […]
Amazon preluded its “big reveal” Wednesday (Fire phone) with a word to app developers: “We’re where you want to be.” The company also struck a deal Wednesday with BlackBerry to offer the Amazon Appstore as a lifeline to BlackBerry’s fledgling of an apps ecosystem. Amazon’s Appstore sits somewhere in the 240,000 app range, coming close to tripling its […]
Apple caused a stir this week when news broke that the upcoming mobile operating system iOS 8 could deliver a blow to location-based trackers by scrambling the MAC (Media Access Control) address. Despite the name, the MAC address is not Apple-specific. Apple began restricting access to MAC addresses last September, when its release of iOS […]
Singapore Telecommunications’ intent to acquire cross-channel ad platform Adconion (at a $235 million valuation) and ad network Kontera (at a $150 million valuation), on behalf of its mobile ad solutions subsidiary Amobee, is yet another example of a telco diving deeper into ad tech. SingTel’s announcement arrives less than a month after news broke of […]
Monetizing apps in the iOS environment means playing by Apple’s rules, and occasionally adapting to changes in how those rules are enforced. Sometimes those changes can impact the way ads are served and tracked, as happened back in February when Apple (briefly) put a barbed wire fence around the use its Identifier For Advertising for […]
JiWire, a mobile advertising company most commonly known for serving ads over airport WiFi networks across the US, has rebranded as “NinthDecimal” and launched a mobile audience-targeting tool for pre-roll video ads. Working with buy-side partner TubeMogul, early beta brand users include L’Oréal Paris, Kraft Foods and Honey Maid. NinthDecimal is ramping up location-based data […]
Millennial Media is beefing up its location data prowess. The mobile ad network is rolling out an audience location ad suite dubbed “Point” and is teaming up with mapping and geo-analytics mainstay Esri. Point unifies three location-based products: Point Audience Frames, powered by Esri, which lets advertisers use hyper-local data to build campaigns; Point-Fencing Route, […]
Twitter has snatched up mobile native advertising provider Namo Media, adding technology to enhance exchange-based monetization for app developers. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, and Twitter declined to comment. Namo Media has roughly eight employees, and will merge its product into the MoPub platform. The company’s SDK helps mobile app developers integrate native advertising by […]
Mobile attribution remains a critical challenge for advertisers. Through a partnership with Verizon (which has struck similar deals with BlueKai, BrightRoll and Turn) the demand-side platform (DSP) provider Run is tackling the challenge of deterministic measurement and mobile attribution via its solution Device Connect. AdExchanger spoke with CEO Seth Hittman and product manager Kim Glaser. […]
Apple unveiled more ways for mobile app developers to monetize their products, among other announcements, at its World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) on Monday. CEO Tim Cook noted during his keynote that the iOS App Store has more than 1.2 million apps and consumers have downloaded more than 75 billion apps. Starting in the fall, […]
Mobile and video ad spend are rising and, while North America is the leader in ad spend, Europe is catching up, according to quarterly reports from ad exchanges Turn and Smaato. Increased competition for inventory continued to drive up effective cost per thousand impression (eCPM) rates across channels, reported Turn. Social media eCPM rose 64%, […]
Vendors are racing to offer advertising solutions for Instagram, which recently struck a multimillion-dollar ad deal with Omnicom. One such company is Culver City, Calif.-based startup theAmplify. The 11-employee firm pegs itself as an “Instagram marketing agency.” AdExchanger spoke with President Justin Rezvani. AdExchanger: What problem are you trying to solve? JUSTIN REZVANI: We want to […]
Mobile app analytics is an increasingly competitive space, as reflected by two acquisitions unveiled Wednesday. Mobile app analytics firm App Annie acquired its competitor, the mobile analytics company Distimo, and Microsoft also bought a mobile app analytics startup. Based in San Francisco, App Annie’s services include app-ranking data, app store SEO tools and marketplace intelligence. […]
FreakOut, a Japanese demand-side platform (DSP), received the green light to issue an IPO on the Tokyo Stock Exchange’s Mothers Index on June 24. The estimated initial offering price is $19 per share, or about $120 million. AdExchanger spoke with Yugo Asato, CEO and co-founder of the mobile DSP Dobleas (a FreakOut spin-off in 2012), […]
App install ads are hot, but what if the apps they advertise are not? Palo Alto, Calif.-based startup Voxel hopes to add an additional dimension to app-install ads via a feature that lets users click on an ad to sample the app in a 30- to 60-second demo that takes over the device’s screen. “We’re […]
App install ads may be a lucrative product for Facebook, Google and other vendors, but they’re becoming too expensive for app developers, especially since scaling is still a problem for the units. “We found it difficult to acquire new users on mobile devices because it’s super expensive,” said Kenny Rosenblatt, founder and CEO of Arkadium […]
Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley wants users to know that the company has moved away from the check-in, its former flagship service. The location-based platform’s future now lies in technology that enables users to do personalized local searches and find their friends on any device. “Our goal is to reinvent local search and local discovery,” said […]
Supply-side platform (SSP) provider PubMatic acquired Mocean Mobile (formerly Mojiva), a mobile ad server, for an undisclosed sum, the companies said on Monday. Mocean Mobile’s ad-serving capabilities and its ad network extend the mobile capabilities PubMatic gained from its 2012 acquisition of mobile development tech startup Mobiprim, according to PubMatic President Kirk McDonald. “We launched […]
Location-based ad network Thinknear (a division of Telenav) on Monday unveiled its Location Score to help advertisers gauge the accuracy of location data. The Location Score is a 100-point scale (100 being most accurate) that helps marketers understand the quality of location data used in their campaigns. The technology uses Thinknear’s platform to quantify the […]
Demand for location-based ad inventory is rising and PubMatic, the supply-side platform (SSP) provider, is one of the latest companies to boost its location-enabled inventory. PubMatic teamed up with location-based ad network xAd to create a programmatic marketplace of location-verified inventory, the companies said Friday. “Location is critical from a mobile standpoint,” said Bob Walczak, […]
As native advertising accelerates, the terminology lags behind. “Native” as a buzzword now encompasses a wide range of solutions – leading to confusion within the industry. One debate is whether in-feed ads (ads inserted in between content) are by default native ads, and whether it should matter. Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo and AOL all offer in-feed ad […]
Are lock screens the next billboards? A growing number of vendors say yes. One such company is Canadian startup Adenda, which launched an SDK on Tuesday that allows developers to add rich media notifications, ads and animations to an Android phone’s lock screen. “We are providing (app developers) new opportunities for monetization and user engagement,” […]
Programmatic and real-time bidding capabilities are quickly emerging as differentiating factors in the native advertising landscape. But as more companies enter the space offering similar features, telling them apart becomes increasingly challenging. Nativo and TripleLift are two such native ad companies that both offer programmatic capabilities. Here’s a snapshot look at how they differ. For […]
Mobile analytics and advertising firm Flurry will allow advertisers to buy VAST-enabled (IAB’s Digital Video Ad Serving Template) video ad units programmatically through its network and marketplace. It also unveiled additional features through its SDK designed to give app developers more options to show video ads on their apps. “For the first time, publishers or […]
Valuing mobile ad inventory is challenging as advertisers struggle assessing viewability, attribution and other measurements. To find out how media-buying agencies tackle this problem, AdExchanger asked agencies, “What are the attributes of quality mobile inventory?” Click below or scroll down to read their responses. Jenn Cox, mobility lead at Starcom USA Jason Pope, VP of AOD at VivaKi JiYoung Kim, […]
