On Friday, NYC-based, demand-side platform MediaMath announced a joint venture with PubliGroupe, a provider of marketing and media sales services, called Spree7. Renato Martignoni, COO of Digital & Marketing Services at PubliGroupe said of the joint venture in a press release, “With our sales network in these markets and the setup of a dedicated team of digital marketing professionals in Berlin, we will help marketing experts make more efficient and effective marketing decisions, thereby fully living up to our mission of making marketing more effective for our clients.” Read more. Auf Deutsch. Et, en français.
MediaMath Co-Founder & GM EMEA Erich Wasserman discussed the deal and its implications.
AdExchanger: What is it that PubliGroupe brings that you couldn’t do on your own – and vice versa?
EW: PubliGroupe’s leadership in the DACH market (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) is unparalleled, and they have a deep understanding of the needs of advertisers and publishers in that region. Part of what we did well when we established our first EMEA office in London last year was to listen to a disparate market and identify needs. This partnership is just one way in which that strategy has born fruit. We chose PubliGroupe as the partner that we feel has the media, data, and market intelligence to bring service to the marketing professional in these markets.
What we bring to the table is a technology platform to optimize 100% of spend for top brands globally. This is something that we spent the last four years (and significant capital investment) building, and as a result PubliGroupe chose to build its programmatic buying practice on top of MediaMath technology rather than build it themselves. It’s a trend we’re seeing more and more in the marketplace, and it allows PubliGroupe to instantly accelerate their penetration in the DACH programmatic buying space.
In terms of the investment made by MediaMath in this joint venture, is there a cash consideration, do you invest people, etc?
Our investment is principally in the technology infrastructure needed to build this business on our DSP. The German market is the largest media market in Europe. Spree7 intends to fuel already heightened demand for programmatic buying in the region, bringing DSP technology — and the attendant benefits to marketers— to DACH.
Spree7 – Where did the name come from? Do you consider it an agency?
The name Spree refers to the famous river flowing across Berlin, the vibrant heart of the digital scene in the DACH region. Based in Berlin, Spree7 brings programmatic buying to agencies and advertisers alike and as such is a specialist in the execution of media strategies that build advertiser business. MediaMath’s book of business in Europe includes companies in Holland, France and the UK who are building their business on our DSP; this is the first instance of MediaMath forming a JV to do so.
How is the pace for audience buying comparing between the U.S. and Europe?
The data markets are maturing across Europe, with the UK and France leading the way in terms of liquidity.
The largest publishers in Europe are now selectively making their data available for buyers, this is because more and more buyers are creating a market for audience data. Crucial to this development is the advance of DSP technology, which means that buyers and sellers can seamlessly interoperate, thus creating data markets.
In addition, we find contextual data exceptionally valuable for marketers. Consistently and across clients we see the value in this kind of data — especially in markets that may lack scaled data offerings.
By John Ebbert
