Mobile advertising platform InMobi today announced the acquisition of Los Angeles-based AerServ for $90 million in cash and stock. The acquisition is expected to help InMobi increase monetisation by 25-30% from its existing set of clients, besides helping secure new clients.
AerServ is an inventory and audience monetisation technology platform for mobile publishers.
According to InMobi CEO Naveen Tewari, the acquisition will enhance monetisation for publishers globally and increase InMobi’s offerings through the creation of InMobi Exchange, a platform with a unified programmatic auction for mobile in app publishers.
Programmatic advertising is the use of software to buy advertising, rather than a manual process.
“This acquisition gives us the capability to use programmatic video, when we have used normal video till now. It gives publishers a lot more options in terms of flexibility and scalability,” said Tewari.
InMobi and AerServ provide over 90% view-ability and over 70% video completion rate, he added. In addition to this, AerServ has integrations with over 75 demand side platforms, exchanges and agencies globally, impacting InMobi’s global footprint.
“With last year’s growth and with this acquisition, we would become the largest advertising platform after Facebook and Google,” Tewari added.
With this investment, InMobi’s video and programmatic business will account for 35% of the overall company revenue. InMobi had said last year that it has turned profitable and plans to end 2017 with revenue of $425-475 million and is on course to record an annual profit of $40 million.
“This will allow us to scale our platforms together across the globe and build a strong business in previously untapped markets such as China and broader APAC,” said Josh Speyer, CEO at AerServ.
Launched in 2013, AerServ’s entire platform and infrastructure is built with a publisher-first objective and focuses on providing support to account managers and software engineers.
