LONDON — The new owner of Ooyala’s adtech unit has promised to “reinvest” in the company as it bids to embrace a continuing digital advertising opportunity.
INVIVI, which facilitates addressable advertising systems for global TV platforms, is acquiring what it calls “the advertising technology division (formerly Videoplaza) of Ooyala”.
That amounts to Pulse, a software-as-a-service ad platform, based in Stockholm, that is used in the programmatic trading of digital video ads, including more than 40 software engineers and account managers in the US, UK, Sweden and India.
“That engineering team and the product are now a part of the INVIDI product suite and will be coming onboard as part of the Avatar platform that we sell to broadcast distribution companies around the world,” says INVIDI COO Bruce Anderson in this video interview with Beet.TV.
So why is INVIDI the latest to give incarnation to Videoplaza?
“It’s been very important for us to try to migrate our capability into the online streaming side of the business really,” Anderson adds.
“The Pulse product gives us a way to accelerate our movement in the direction.”
In other words, INVIDI – already facilitating ad targeting to customers’ traditional-style big TV – thinks there is still a growth opportunity in online video advertising.
Anderson continues: “Rather than having to develop all of that technology from scratch, we can leverage the excellent technology that the Pulse team has developed in servicing great clients like Sky in India and add that to our existing capabilities and really integrate the two platforms so that – irrespective of how a consumer is getting their video streams – they can get an addressable ad experience, whether they’re on broadcast or streaming, and it all works in one seamless fashion.”
And Anderson says INVIDI will “reinvest” in Pulse. “(We will) start marketing that into some of our customers within North America, and also leverage a lot of Pulse’s existing relationships in other parts of the world to get them exposed to the Avatar product.”
INVIDI’s acquisition represents another stamp in the passport of Videoplaza…
- Ooyala, the online video technology supplier, acquired Sweden-based Videoplaza for $270 million back in 2014.
- That was the same year that Ooyala itself was acquired by Australian telco Telstra, with plans to take it public.
- After difficulties that led to job cuts, however, in 2018 Telstra wrote down Ooyala’s value to zero, and said it had made a total $500 million in historic write-offs against the company.
- This October, Ooyala’s management completed a buy-out from Telstra.
- Now New Jersey-based INVIDI, which helps deliver addressable advertising to TV set-top boxes around the world, is acquiring what it says is “the advertising technology division (formerly Videoplaza) of Ooyala”.
This video is part of Beet.TV’s coverage of the Future of TV Advertising Forum 2018, London. The series is sponsored by Finecast. For more segments from the series, visit this page.
