Advertising intelligence provider Integral Ad Science has acquired Simplytics, a UK-based mobile ad server and analytics platform. The deal brings mobile verification capabilities for in-app and mobile Web campaigns to Integral’s existing verification services for video and display ads.
“We’re very excited because Simplytics is complementary to what we do and once we add our fraud capability to it, we’ll be able to measure fraud in all three channels: video, display and mobile,” said Integral Ad Science CEO Scott Knoll.
By analyzing traffic patterns and other signals, Integral’s technology is designed to flag suspicious traffic in real time and prevent advertisers from serving ads to it. It also offers metrics on the number of ads that were viewed and which ones had the highest viewability rates.
Simplytics is a UK-based startup with about a dozen employees. It offers a mobile ad server and analytics platform for managing ad campaigns across smartphones, tablets, in-app ads and mobile Web. Its clients roster includes Microsoft, Peugeot, Samsung, Starbucks and Virgin Media.
Integral will allow Simplytics to maintain its current contracts with clients as it integrates the company’s technology into its services, Knoll said. The integration process is expected to be completed within Q2 this year.
“We want Simplytics to continue to innovate around mobile and we’ll add our verification services to what they do,” Knoll said. “We’ll also be working with our partners such as Turn, The Trade Desk, Google, AppNexus and Mediaocean to use the mobile data along with our other data in pre-bids so that advertisers will know whether their bids are safe or not.”
Ad fraud is an ongoing issue that impacts numerous areas of online advertising. It was a prominent topic of discussion at the IAB’s Annual Leadership Meeting in Palm Springs, Calif.
“We’ve got to stop devaluing digital media,” Ziff Davis CEO and newly appointed IAB chairman Vivek Shah told a room full of publishers, advertisers and ad-tech vendors. “It’s simple. No more traffic fraud. Let’s end it.”
Dstillery CEO Tom Phillips echoed Shah’s message the following day, noting, “we’re all responsible for this problem and we all need to be engaged in the solution.”
Other companies are also building out their fraud detection services. DoubleVerify announced on Monday that it had acquired the intellectual property and technology assets from RealTargeting, a software company that identifies online ad fraud.
The RealTargeting technology will be integrated with the DoubleVerify Fraud Protection suite, which addresses fraud schemes such as bot fraud, hidden ads and impression laundering.
