Creative Still Rules At Cannes; Placed Gets New Partnerships

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign-up here.

Cannes, Cont.

Cannes coverage continues with a piece by the WSJ’s Jack Marshall, who debunks the idea that ad tech has usurped the celebration of creativity that the festival was build on. The truth isn’t that ad tech is taking over, according to Marshall, but rather that advertising is becoming more digital by the day. And as the nature of digital players change, advertising evolves with it. “AppNexus is at Cannes because it’s the epicenter of digital advertising innovation and conversation,” AppNexus CEO Brian O’Kelley told the Journal. “Snapchat isn’t ad tech, nor is Daily Mail – but they are representative of the future of advertising.” Read it.

More Partners For Placed

Location insights firm Placed inked eight new partnerships on Wednesday, in addition to issuing two patents on location measurement and validation. RadiumOne, Samba TV, Tremor Video, 4INFO and GumGum are among the new firms using Placed Attribution to measure how their ads impact retail activity. “Placed Attribution enables GumGum to connect in-image and in-screen advertising to store visit, delivering an accurate and complete view on the impact of digital advertising on store visits,” explained Ben Plomion, SVP of marketing at GumGum. See the release and read more via Street Fight.

Google Play Music’s Makeover

Google debuted its remodeled music streaming service, Google Play Music, in a bid for digital audio ad budgets. But it will have to compete with Spotify, Pandora and Apple’s impending service to earn a spot at the table. Adweek reporter Lauren Johnson points out how Google’s take on music streaming could disrupt the current Internet radio ad market. For one, Google’s got search and email data that competitors lack. “If Google is able to weave Google Play Music with the technology that powers the world’s most dominant search engine, it has a chance to distinguish itself against the long list of smaller online music companies also trying to crack music discovery,” Johnson writes. Read on.

Broadly Speaking

Unilever and Vice are preparing ad campaigns to populate the media company’s upcoming female-focused channel, Broadly. The partnership was announced at Cannes by Unilever CMO Keith Weed and Vice Chief Creative Director Eddy Moretti. Unilever got in on the ground floor of Vice five years ago with a series of Axe promotions, but the mega-brand is particularly interested in Broadly, as 77% of Unilever products are purchased by women. Content will be developed by the two companies for YouTube and Vice’s own online channels. Ad Age has more.

The Qwilt Bundle

Qwilt, a company that makes networking equipment to enable online video for firms like Time Warner Cable and Comcast, announced on Wednesday a Series D funding round of $25 million, bringing the startup’s total funding to $65 million. This round was led by Disrupt-ive, and includes continued investments from Google Chairman Eric Schmidt and Cisco’s investment arm. Video content already accounts for two-thirds of all Internet traffic and is growing fast. Companies like Qwilt that enable service providers to distribute content without clogging network pipes, which Qwilt does by deploying on hardware at the neighborhood level, are in a strong position. Check it out at Re/code.

You’re Hired!