AOL to Acquire Adap.tv for Video Advertising Business

RMN Digital | August 7, 2013 | Americas, Corporate, Feature, Finance, Regions | No Comments

Leading online content company AOL (NYSE: AOL) today announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire Adap.tv, Inc., a leading programmatic video advertising platform for brands, agencies, and publishers.

The combination of AOL On and Adap.tv will give AOL a unique end-to-end solution and video stack for publishers and advertisers – from premium original production, to content aggregation and syndication platforms, video CMS technology, and now a leading programmatic video platform.

“The combination of AOL and Adap.tv will create a leading video platform in the industry,” said Tim Armstrong, chairman and CEO of AOL. “The Adap.tv founders and team are on a mission to make advertising as easy as e-commerce and the two companies together will aggressively pursue that vision.”

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In 2012, according to AOL, Adap.tv supported more than 26,000 global ad campaigns, which ran on approximately 9,500 websites and was used by many top brand advertisers.

“At Adap.tv, we are focused on building the most important business within the most important category in digital advertising,” said Amir Ashkenazi, CEO, Adap.tv.

“We believe that most TV advertising will soon be traded programmatically on platforms like ours. The combination of AOL and Adap.tv accelerates our vision of efficient and effective TV and video advertising.”

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Adap.tv will operate independently as part of AOL’s video organization which is led by Ran Harnevo, SVP, Video, and be included as part of the overall solution offered by AOL Networks to its publisher and advertiser partners.

AOL Networks, under the leadership of recently named CEO Bob Lord, partners with leading publishers, advertisers and agencies seeking to maximize the value of their online investments. AOL Networks brands include Advertising.com, The AOL On Network, Be On, ADTECH and Pictela.

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The purchase price will total $405 million in aggregate and will be comprised of approximately $322 million in cash consideration, and approximately $83 million in AOL common stock, subject to certain adjustments.

AOL expects to close the acquisition in the third quarter of 2013.

In the picture above: Amir Ashkenazi, CEO, Adap.tv (left) and Tim Armstrong, Chairman & CEO, AOL (right)