Google To Buy Apigee For $625M; Target Expands Its Marketing Platform

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

Hungry Cloud

Google will acquire API management provider Apigee for $625 million. Apigee comes to Google with a list of enterprise clients (Walgreens, AT&T, Burberry and Live Nation among them) and helps their developer APIs talk to each other and collaborate on digital business functions. The solution will be incorporated into Google’s cloud suite, which it has been aggressively building out to compete with the likes of Amazon and Adobe. “The transition toward cloud, mobile and digital interaction with customers and partners via APIs is happening, and fast,” writes Google SVP Diane Greene, who’s leading the enterprise cloud services charge. “It’s happening because customers of every stripe – in the consumer realm and in the enterprise – are demanding it.” Read the blog.

Targeting Advertisers

Target vs. Walmart Exchange? The big-box retailer is expanding its supplier-centric marketing platform (read: the manufacturers who sell products at Target) to national automotive, financial and travel advertisers. “What we have packaged is access to our guests,” Kristi Argyilan, SVP of media and guest engagement, told Ad Age. “We use first-party data for a very active shopper who has a ring of influence that is important – there are a lot of marketers that would love the opportunity to be able to place ads in front of those consumers.” Target already had a media marketplace, dubbed Bullseye, but this expansion will foreseeably link ad exposures to sales effectiveness and ROI. More.

Over The Top, If You Can

Verizon has spent $200 million on content for its Go90 streaming media platform and $75 million-$100 million marketing Go90 to users (who, for the most part, still have no idea what Go90 is), according to reporting from Sahil Patel at Digiday. Go90 is ad-supported, a position that Netflix has eschewed. “Netflix is nearly 20 years old; Hulu is 10; YouTube is 11. None of these things happen overnight,” says Chip Canter, a former NBC exec Verizon brought in as GM of Go90 and digital entertainment. They’ll have more than a year – and apparently plenty of cash – to make Go90 work, but otherwise it could end up joining the “never” pantheon: Never get involved in a land war in Asia; Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line; Never start an ad-supported streaming-TV platform. More.

Transparency Poll

The ANA’s follow-up transparency report suggests marketers should implement a chief media officer role at their organizations [AdExchanger coverage]. But are marketers biting? The Drum surveyed marketers and media buyers and got mixed opinions. According to Paul Frampton, CEO at Havas Media Group, a client-side chief media officer would “provide more meaningful long-term value than today’s obsessive pursuit of short-term pricing alone.” Some, however, see the onus of in-house media responsibilities as unfeasible for marketers. “Planning, buying and digital expertise … needs to rest in agencies,” said David Wheldon, CMO at RBS. Others don’t think a chief media officer role would have any impact on transparency whatsoever. “A head of media role … is very different from someone who is going to cover the transparency issue,” said Amanda Pitt, partner at Grace Blue. More.

But Wait, There’s More!