Tech talk: Mobile native ads, premium video inventory, more

Multi-screen advertising company Pixels added to its mobile native-ad offering with two new rich-media ad products. Dubbed LISA and EVA, the formats join the company's first mobile native product, MONA, which launched in October.

Kevin Huang, CEO, Pixels:

We are pleased with the success of MONA. It has been well received by clients and brands alike. Since its launch six months ago, we have deployed over 300 campaigns, delivering results that matter for our clients. We have also heard feedback from clients and brands that a rich-media solution geared towards story telling and branding was needed within the mobile native 

LISA (for "Listing Scroller Ad") is a non-intrusive rich and dynamic story-telling canvas that reveals itself as users scroll through content on a mobile device. It features a full page HTML5 ad that is rich-media enabled with full interactive functions.

EVA ("Embedded Video in Article") is an out-stream video ad format that appears in between content on a mobile device and allows advertisers to feature video commercial that run up to 60 seconds.

The formats are now available in-app and on mobile web on the Pixels Ad Marketplace on over 150 mobile partners. The company claims mobile reach of 99 percent across all smartphones in Hong Kong, including 100 percent reach on iOS and 99 percent on Android devices, reaching more than 4.754 million unique visitors monthly.

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Quantcast and inventory-management platform SpotX formed a partnership to combine Quantcast’s modelling and targeting with SpotX’s access to premium video supply. The global partnership offers Quantcast access to SpotX’s network of premium publishers in Australia, New Zealand and 27 other markets.

Andrew Double, MD, Quantcast ANZ: 

More brands are seeing the value in programmatic and are starting to invest heavily in digital video. This partnership affords us access to premium video inventory while overlaying the smarts of our sophisticated data and decisioning. This increased scale will put us in a strong position to meet the market demand for programmatic video.

Christopher Blok, SpotX country manager, ANZ:

Programmatic video innovations have introduced explosive growth to video advertising, enabling buyers to manage complicated, cross-screen buys among targeted audiences. Our partnership with Quantcast helps us enhance the value of our publishers’ inventory, and provide advertisers with more effective and scalable targeting options.

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Customer-identity player Signal announced a partnership with cross-screen technology company Tapad to extend device connectivity for Signal’s clients in North America, APAC, and EMEA using Tapad’s proprietary Device Graph.

The integration will enable Signal clients to build an even broader view of their known customers across multiple devices, according to the companies. Specifically, the partnership also allows Signal’s clients to integrate in real-time with Tapad’s media platform, Unify, which enables real-time activation and buying decisions, as well as automated reporting and measurement.

Marc Kiven, founder and CRO, Signal:

Continuously recognising customers across devices instantly and in a privacy-safe way is essential for marketers to stay competitive. We are thrilled to enter this unique, global partnership with Tapad, enabling our clients to access their technology and more effectively reach customers in real-time and at scale.

Pierre Martensson, SVP and GM of Tapad’s global data division:

Being able to leverage a persistent view of customer connections across devices is a huge challenge for brands,” said . “With Tapad, Signal is now able to connect with the billions of existing data points in our Device GraphTM to help clients better understand customer behavior and realise even stronger customer engagement.

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Singapore-based Ematic Solutions, which offers an AI-enabled, cloud-based, digital-marketing platform, has raised an additional US$2.4 million, closing its pre-Series A financing, bringing total investment to US$4.4 million to date.

The company said it is talking to several investors for Series A funding, which will be used to "cement a dominant market position in Southeast Asia", accelerate expansion across APAC, enhance the product suite with a stronger mobile offering, and build out a highly scalable self-service model.

Paul Tenney, CEO and founder, Ematic Solutions:

Our growth is tripling year-on-year, and since October 2015 monthly recurring revenue (MRR) has continued to double every six months. We have also completed our first year of market expansion in Southeast Asia—Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines—and our staff has more than quadrupled from 20 in early 2016 to more than 80 now. While continuing to build SEA market dominance, we also have our sights on Asia-Pacific, with the recent opening of our Hong Kong office as a launch pad for North Asia. We have 60 open positions in all markets, including Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Hong Kong.

Investors in the pre-Series A round are new investor Walden International and existing investors Wavemaker Partners, MDI Ventures and Convergence Ventures.