Home Podcast Darren Glatt: Avoiding ‘Zombies’ When Investing In Ad Tech
Podcast

Darren Glatt: Avoiding ‘Zombies’ When Investing In Ad Tech

By

SHARE:

This week on the AdExchanger Talks podcast, we’re pleased to talk with Darren Glatt, a seasoned investor and MediaMath board member. Glatt is the guy who led Searchlight Capital’s $225 million investment in MediaMath, which closed almost exactly a year ago. He shares his point of view on the current state of play in ad tech and how MediaMath can grow over the next two to three years.

“Ad tech gets a horrible reputation as a result of the zombie companies and companies that have gone into receivership,” such as Videology and Sizmek, Glatt says. “But there’s still a small but thriving group of independent companies that continues to do very well. And I believe MediaMath to be one of those.”

In that open landscape, there are just a handful of players that matter in the sense of having scale, global coverage and omnichannel capabilities, according to Glatt. MediaMath is one and as such has a large future opportunity if it can maintain discipline and focus, something that has occasionally proven elusive at the company.

“Part of my role as a private equity investor is to say, ‘OK, there are 10 ideas but really only three of them are going to drive 90% of the value,’” he says.

In this episode: What are those three ideas? Will the US break up big tech? Will the telecoms win the TV wars?

Must Read

IVT detection

CleanTap Says It Easily Fooled Programmatic Tech With Spoofed CTV Devices

CleanTap claims that 100% of the invalid traffic it spoofed was accepted into live auctions run by programmatic platforms and was successfully bid on by advertisers.

bot detection

HUMAN Expands Its IVT Detection Tool Kit With A New Product For Advertisers, Not Platforms

HUMAN has recently started complementing its bid request analysis by analyzing the time between when a bot clicks an ad and when the landing page loads. Now it’s offering the solution to individual advertisers.

sell-side curation

Index Exchange Launches A Data Marketplace For Sell-Side Curation

Through Index Exchange’s data vendor marketplace, curators gain access to third-party data sets without needing their own integrations.

Privacy! Commerce! Connected TV! Read all about it. Subscribe to AdExchanger Newsletters
Technology

Can Publishers Trust The Trade Desk’s New Wrapper?

TTD says OpenAds is not just a reaction to Prebid’s TID change, but a new model for fairer, more transparent ad auctions. So what does the DSP need to do to get publishers to adopt its new auction wrapper?

Privacy

Scott Spencer’s New Startup Wants To Help Users Monetize Their Online Advertising Data

What happens when an ad tech developer partners with a cybersecurity expert to start a new company? You end up with a consumer product that is both a privacy software service and a programmatic advertising ID.

Former FTC commissioner Alvaro Bedoya speaks to AdExchanger Managing Editor Allison Schiff at Programmatic IO NY 2025.
Technology

Advertisers Probably Shouldn’t Target Teens At All, Cautions Former FTC Commissioner

Alvaro Bedoya shared his qualms with digital advertising’s more controversial targeting tactics and how kids use gen AI and social media.

Popular

  1. PODCAST: The Big Story

    The Trade Desk’s Sell-Side Settlement

    With its PubDesk wrapper, The Trade Desk is putting roots into ad tech’s sell side. But publishers are wary.

  2. Publishers

    People Inc. Cuts 6% Of Its Workforce

    The layoffs reflect a strategic decision on People Inc.’s part to free up money to invest in growth areas, according to CEO Neil Vogel’s memo to employees.

  3. Commerce

    How Retail Media Takes Over Everything

    Retail media has broken through some critical threshold, and is no longer the straightforward digitalization of shopper marketing budgets.

  4. CTV Roundup

    It’s Official: TiVo Is No Longer A DVR Company. What Now?

    TiVo has officially halted the sale and manufacture of its once-revolutionary DVR products. Which raises the question: What does TiVo even do anymore, anyway?

  5. AdExchanger Content Studio

    TV’s Powerful Halo Effect: What It Is, How To Measure It And How You Can Harness It

    You just launched a new campaign across multiple channels, from search to social. Perhaps you’ve gone out on a limb – maybe even against the recommendation of your CEO or board – and included streaming TV in the mix.