Android Overtakes Apple in Smaato Ad Metrics

Smaato has published its Mobile Advertising Metrics Report for January 2010. January’s metrics show a significant improvement of Android device clickthrough rates compared to December, rising from 65 to 163, but Symbian handsets remain top of the list. The metrics also reveal the average response time of ad networks worldwide as 256 milliseconds (ms). The fastest response time was 43 ms, the slowest, 887 ms.
Smaato’s metrics are based upon 35 mobile ad networks and over 4 billion ad requests served in the Smaato Network of more than 2,300 registered mobile publishers in January 2010.
The boost in Android clickthrough rates comes on the back of a large uptake in Android ad requests in the Smaato network and newly-introduced Android devices, including the Google Nexus One, Motorola Droid and operator-branded handsets. Smaato believes the increase in Android clickthrough rates could also be partly attributable to new owners of Android handsets, who are curious about responding to mobile advertising.
Symbian handsets still hold the highest clickthrough rate of 173, compared to the averaged Index of 100, an increase on the figure of 161 in December. The iPhone and iPod touch score 104, down from 119 in decemberm, but this is still enough to put Apple in third place in the Smaato Index.
The report also measures the fill rate of ads across different mobile advertising networks. This is defined as the percentage of ads delivered per ad request, and varies by factors such as country, device and content type. The ad networks are not named in the monthly Smaato metrics, but are revealed in the dashboard of registered Smaato publishers reporting and analytics tools.
The top performing mobile ad network worldwide had a fill rate of 89% in January 2010, a 10% increase compared to the best-performing ad network in December. Despite this increase, the average worldwide ad network fill rate fell from 35% in December to 29% in January. This confirms that mobile advertising had a very strong holiday season in 2009. In the second half of January, the industry saw higher fill rates as campaigns and advertisers returned to business.
The average fill rate of mobile ad networks in the US was 47%, compared to 55% in December 2009. The fill rate figure for the UK is very low at only 7%, with the top-performing mobile ad network achieving a fill rate of 33% In India, the fill rate was only 8%, despite the presence of one very high performing network.
There’s more information about Smaato’s mobile advertising metrics in a Whitepaper, ‘Global Choices in Mobile Advertising’, which is available for download here.

Friendticker Unveils Check-in-based Mobile Ad Solution

Friendticker, which describes itself as “the first mobile customer loyalty platform to apply virtual check-in technology exclusively for brands and small-scale advertisers”, has announced the impending launch of its iPhone application in public beta mode at Mobile World Congress on 15 February.
The company says the app enables advertisers and marketing managers to identify the most useful data for a specific individual at a specific time and place. The platform provides advertisers with the ability to increase customer retention rates by adding virtual check-ins to a brand or venue.
Friendticker says it transforms the social media check-in concept and applies it as a marketing tool to directly interact with brands, and rewards interaction with the brand instantly. The app adapts the game-based, virtual check-in technology of current social applications to make it specific for a mobile marketing platform that brands can use to target their own customers within their virtual local community.
The company notes that in current social network companies that focus on virtual check-in, a badge has no real-life value. In the Friendticker model, instead of badges, the platform lets advertisers provide items of the advertiser’s choice. With Friendticker, each user receives items for his action and interaction with the brand, and the item becomes a representation of the real-world item. This allows the advertiser or marketer to define what the user receives and which items are exchangeable for real-world goods. There is no limit to the amount of items that a user can receive and the items could represent a free drink n a cafe, for example, or a money-off coupon. Friendticker is sold on a CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and CPL (cost per lead) model.
“Current virtual check-in applications are only scratching the surface of what's possible for local businesses through mobile,” says Friendticker Co-founder, Florian Resatsch. “Friendticker gives real-life value to a customer's mobile actions beyond the gaming aspect of first generation virtual check-in technology. By combining social networks, geo-placement and real-time search to add value on top of who you are,
what you are doing and where you are, local and small scale advertisers can create and launch mobile campaigns that reach their target audience."

Greystripe Celebrates 99 cent Program Success

Mobile ad network Greystripe has released the results of its ‘99 cents per download’ program for iPhone application developers who ran ads for free apps on the Greystripe network.
The program was initiated because many app developers were becoming dissatisfied with mobile advertising’s low conversion rates and high prices per download, since they pay for every click in a CPC (cost per click) pricing model irrespective of whether it leads to a download. Greystripe’s program offered developers a guaranteed cost of 99 cents per download, with no charge for clicks that did not lead to a download.
The 99 cent per download program was offered to the first 200 developers who signed up. Brands included Kraft, the world’s second largest food company; Chorus, an iPhone app developed by envIO; and PlayMesh, which specialises in social gaming on the iPhone.
All campaigns reached their download targets at 99 cents per download, including PlayMesh with its popular iFarm by PlayMesh farm simulation game. The iFarm game received a 56% conversion rate on clicks and Greystripe generated more than 60,000 downloads with the 99 cent download program. During this time, iFarm rose to the number one spot in the iPhone’s free app ranking.
“It’s important that our mobile ad network provides an engaging ad format that aligns with our social gaming experience,” says PlayMesh Founder, Charles Ju. “After signing up for Greystripe’s 99 cent download program, we noticed the conversion rates on iFarm increase almost immediately.”
“These results demonstrate the success of our rich media ad formats and the significance of offering a highly interactive experience to our developers,” said Kevin Granath, VP of Sales for Greystripe. “We’re thrilled with the success of the program, and we will continue to offer our developers opportunities to monetize their apps and drive downloads.”

BuzzCity Reports Strong Mobile Ad Growth

BuzzCity has released its Global Mobile Advertising Index for 2009. The data shows that mobile advertising grew by 41% in 2009 compared to 2008, with countries including Turkey, Germany, Saudi Arabia and Mexico seeing growth of 300% or more. Indonesia, India, USA and South Africa continue to dominate, with 33 countries now delivering monthly traffic exceeding 10 million impressions.
The top five most active countries in Q4 ’09 were:

1. Indonesia - 2.1 billion impressions
2. India - 644 million impressions
3. S. Africa - 312 million impressions
4. United States - 301 million impressions
5. Saudi Arabia - 192 million impressions

“Q4 showed an accelerated growth with the return of advertisers, not just in the newly established mobile markets, but also in markets where digital marketing is dominated by fixed line Internet pricing, such as the US, Canada, UK, France and Germany,” says BuzzCity CEO, KF Lai. “New markets such as Mexico are showing real advertiser interest with growth of 294%.”
The Global Mobile Advertising Index tracks activity across BuzzCity’s network of more than 2,000 publishers across the globe. The findings represent a measure of advertiser demand for mobile Internet advertising.
BuzzCity believes that the only threat to further growth in 2010 will be the potential increase in price of the mobile Internet, as bandwidth availability becomes prohibitive. The technology developments and consumer buy-in have meant that mobile advertising is generating real returns for advertisers, the company says, adding that it will therefore be interesting to see how the telecoms industry responds to current capacity challenges."

The Great Mobile Advertising Experiment

So Orange has become the latest operator to open up at least some of its subscriber database to advertisers. Brands will no doubt be delighted, though they will be even more so when the number of subscribers available rises beyond the 100,000 with which Orange is launching.
One of the major criticisms levelled at Blyk (whose technology Orange now owns and is using), was that while it was a great offering for test campaigns, it never had the reach to enable brands to run a full-blown campaign, and that was when it had twice as many people on it as Orange is launching with. No wonder brands in Turkey are so keen on Turkcell’s permission marketing database, which at the last count numbered 9 million.
Still, at least Orange is giving numbers, something which O2 has so far steadfastly refused to do for its O2 More offering, arguing that the figure is “commercially sensitive”. Orange has now also come up with an answer to a question we posed this morning, about how many messages it will permit those on the database to receive in a given time period. It says that initially, it is allowing three messages per week, but adds that this limit is not set in stone. (Orange also confirmed that someone texting ‘STOP’ does not count as a response, in the sense of a positive response quoted in response rate figures. A cynical question to ask, you might think, but one that needed asking in the light of rumours we heard about another ad-funded mobile offering.) O2 caps the number of messages at one advertising message per user per day.
This could be a crucial factor in the success or otherwise of these initiatives. Because consumers may be happy to opt in to ads on the promise that what they will receive will be relevant and, potentially, financially rewarding, if they are being offered discounts and special offers, for example. But the minute the offers and ads stop being relevant, or the minute they start getting too many of them, may well be the point at which they opt out, and the operators find themselves with an asset that is diminishing, rather than increasing, over time.
I really hope this doesn’t happen. Because if these moves are a success, if nothing else, it will prove what those on the mobile marketing coalface have been preaching since day one. That if you are open, transparent, and seek consumers’ permission, marketing to people on their mobile isn’t the least bit spammy, (as those coming to mobile for the first time often wrongly assume), but potentially, as good as marketing can get. Whether brands and mobile operators can capitalise on this potential will depend on how carefully they manage the process; on whether they can resist killing the goose that might one day just lay the golden egg.
It will be a year or two before we know the answer to this one.

David Murphy
Editor

Orange Launches Orange Shots Opt-in Ad Service

Orange UK is opening up part of its subscriber database to advertisers, following last year’s acquisition of ad-funded MVNO, Blyk.
‘Orange Shots’ is a mobile advertising service that enables brands to engage and interact directly with targeted segments of Orange’s customer base. Launching with full-service commercial offers from 1 February, Orange Shots will initially be available to brands who want to interact with an audience of 100,000 customers from part of Orange’s ‘Monkey’ pay-as-you-go customer base. Orange says that new profiles and customer segments will quickly follow.
Orange Shots is designed to enable participating brands, to create rich, creative and engaging mobile advertising campaigns targeted towards customers’ interests and preferences. Orange says the solution will offer brands the ability to engage in real-time conversations with customers who are happy to hear from them; a highly-targeted audience base with no wastage; an opportunity to build an engaging and enduring relationship with customers as they get to know more about their profiles and interests; and high response rates, with great viral potential.
Orange Shots service works across SMS and MMS mobile platforms, encouraging customers to message back and give views and opinions. In addition to offers, customers will also receive a variety of benefits, including exclusive news and gossip, amusing and entertaining content, film and games previews, and up to date sports information, Orange says.
Orange has been testing Orange Shots extensively with its own content and brands including 4Music, Ubisoft, COI and Snickers since September 2009. Orange says that  brands who have already trialled the service have found it to provide a higher conversion rate than any other media, offering response rates of between 21-39%. Orange says its priority is customer and brand satisfaction and as such the audience roll out programme will be considered and measured. Orange customers have the opportunity to opt out at any stage, and Orange customer data will not be shared externally with third parties.
Orange adds that it plans to make Orange Shots, powered by Blyk Media, available to its entire mobile customer base over time, giving brands the opportunity to engage with a variety of specific demographic segments.
“Orange Shots will transform mobile advertising as we know it,” says Marc Overton, VP of Wholesale, Business Development and Partnerships for Orange UK. “It’s a win-win for brands, as well as our customers, with advertisers continually seeking new and innovative ways to engage with consumers, and our customers getting rewarded with access to exclusive, interactive content and offers, knowing that they’re tailored specifically to them and their interests.”
We have asked Orange if there are any limits on the number of advertising messages that anyone opted in to the service will receive in a given timeframe, and we are awaiting a response. We have also asked the network to confirm that the response rates quoted do not include customers responding with a ‘STOP’ message, or other message asking to be opted out of the service.

iPhone Dominates AdMob Requests in Western Europe and US

AdMob has released its December 2009 AdMob Mobile Metrics Report. The report focuses on regional changes in manufacturer and Smartphone Operating System (OS) share. It finds that Apple and the iPhone OS leads in Western Europe, North America, Latin American and Oceania, due to millions of iPhones and iPod touches sold this year and heavy application usage. Nokia and the Symbian OS continues to lead in Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe with its vast portfolio of devices.
The December 2009 AdMob Mobile Metrics Report breaks down, by region, trended manufacturer share across all mobile devices, Smartphone OS share, and the top handsets and Smartphones in the AdMob network. Regional highlights from the report include:

• Western Europe: Apple made strong gains in manufacturer share in 2009. In Q4 2009 the Apple iPhone and iPod touch generated more than half of the total requests from the region at the expense of Nokia, Samsung, and Sony Ericsson. Android had a strong Q4 2009 and generated an 8% share of Smartphone requests, second only to North America in penetration.
• North America: In Q4 2009, Apple led with 40%, followed by Samsung with 17% and Motorola with 11%. The iPhone generated 54% of Smartphone requests in Q4 2009. Android share grew throughout the year, reaching 27% in Q4, by far the highest penetration in any region.
• Asia: Nokia continues to be the leading manufacturer in Asia by a wide margin, with 53% of requests in Q4 2009. After launching in several countries in Asia in 2009, the iPhone had a strong Q4 and doubled its share of Smartphone requests to 27%.
• Latin America: Several device manufacturers had significant share in Q4 2009, Apple led with 39%, Nokia had 15% and Sony Ericsson had 11% of device requests. The Sony PlayStation Portable was the number three device in December 2009. Although it only generated 8% of Smartphone requests, RIM had three of the top 10 Smartphones in the region.
• Africa: Nokia’s share remained fairly steady in 2009, generating more than 50% of requests throughout the year. In Q4, Samsung and Sony Ericsson devices generated 18% and 9% of requests, respectively. Symbian was the dominant smartphone OS generating 87% of Smartphone requests and accounting for nine of the top 10 smartphones in Q4 2009.
• Oceania: Apple’s share increased dramatically throughout 2009 and its devices are responsible for the vast majority of requests in the region. The top 10 Smartphones in Q4 2009 included the iPhone, HTC Magic, HTC Hero, BlackBerry 9000 and six different Nokia models.
• Eastern Europe: Nokia’s share decreased slightly throughout the year to 35% in Q4 2009. Apple, Sony Ericsson, and Samsung devices generated 23%, 12% and 9% of requests, respectively. Eight of the top 10 Smartphones in the region were Nokia devices, including the 6300, N70, and N95.

AdMob stores and analyses handset and operator data from every ad request in its network of more than 15,000 mobile websites and iPhone, Android, and webOS applications to optimise ad serving. Each month, the AdMob Mobile Metrics Report aggregates this data to provide insights into major trends in the mobile ecosystem. The AdMob share is calculated by the percentage of requests received from a particular handset; it is a measure of relative mobile web and application usage and does not represent handset sales.
You can access the full report, as well as past reports from previous months, here.

YOC Launches Blind Ad Network

YOC, which operates a European premium mobile marketing network, has launched a blind mobile ad network, the Ubiyoo Marketplace, which is made up of blind network Ubiyoo World and premium blind network Ubiyoo Connect. YOC says the Ubiyoo Marketplace has already received more than 1 billion ad requests from publishers in Europe, North and South America, Australia, Asia and S. Africa. In a blind ad network, advertisers can specify the types of site they want to advertise on, but not specific sites.
The blind ad network, Ubiyoo Marketplace is a globally designed, self service technology platform that brings advertisers and publishers together on the mobile Internet based on a variable price system. It offers advertisers the opportunity to efficiently place ads on the mobile Internet on the basis of a CPC (cost per click) or CPM (cost per thousand) price model that can be determined individually. Publishers can target their adverts by country, mobile network, handset type, time of day or theme of mobile web page, such as news, sports or social networking site. The premium blind network operates on similar principles, but contains a higher proportion of premium publishers.
“YOC’s heritage in our open premium network and the long-standing relationships we have developed with leading publishers across Europe stands us in good stead to launch a premium blind network,” says YOC CEO, Dirk Kraus. “Unlike other ad networks who have launched blind networks first, we are coming at this from a different angle and are enabling brands and publishers to harness the inventory available in the best possible way. Helping publishers to monetise their mobile websites efficiently and effectively is at the heart of what we do.”
The Ubiyoo Marketplace is driven by YOC’s AdServer technology which powers the optimised delivery of advertising tools, and offers a number of real-time reporting and analysis options. Publishers are guaranteed delivery of the campaigns with the highest clickthrough rates and cost per thousand to enable them to generate an increased turnover.

Brands Fail to Measure Mobile, says Bango

83% of brands do not use mobile specific analytic tools, leading to inaccurate data on campaign performance, according to research conducted by Bango. Of those that do implement some form of campaign analytics, only 17% said they had sourced a specialised mobile solution designed to measure mobile user behaviour accurately and consistently. Even more surprisingly, 27% admit to not implementing any analytics in their mobile campaigns.
Bango surveyed over 100 participants in a webinar run in late 2009, including brands, agencies and specialist mobile providers. Over 90% of these brands said they will increase their mobile advertising investment in 2010. Global spending on mobile advertising in 2009 was $500 million (£310 million), according to Juniper Research.
“The positive from this data is that mobile marketing is in growth mode, at a time when other forms of advertising are being squeezed hard,” says Bango CEO, Ray Anderson. “Yet eight out of 10 of those surveyed do not take the essential step of implementing mobile analytics to capture accurate user data. Accurate and comprehensive reporting is what will drive brands to focus more on their mobile marketing campaigns.”
With mobile advertising now an integral part of many brands digital marketing strategy, knowing what happens after the user clicks is essential, says Bango. The company has recently released a new version of its mobile campaign analytics solution, which provides brands and agencies with powerful reporting tools and custom filters that deliver insight into how individual customers interact with mobile advertising and search marketing campaigns. 
Bango’s says its analytics solution is more accurate than traditional analytics solutions, with the ability to persistently identify individuals across multiple marketing campaigns, ad networks, search engines, websites and connections, including users switching between their carrier network and wi-fi. To help brands and agencies measure their mobile marketing campaigns accuraately, Bango offers a 30 day free trial of its mobile analytics package. There’s more information here.

Mobixell Buys 724 Solutions

Mobixell Networks, which provides mobile multimedia and advertising solutions, has bought mobile Internet firm, 724 Solutions. The merged company will create a global organisation with local sales and support capability in the US, UK, China, Switzerland, India, Israel, and other countries, and with a customer base of over 350 mobile operators worldwide.
The expanded company will focus on delivering rich media mobile Internet and messaging solutions for mobile operators, enabling them to exploit the opportunities presented by the explosion of rich-media data traffic and the emergence of new exciting communication patterns driven by the ever increasing mobile media consumption on laptops, iPhones and other smartphones.
The rationale for the acquisition was driven by a joint vision of the two management teams, also shared by the combined company’s customers and channel partners, as well as compelling synergies in the core competencies and technologies. 724 Solutions’ Seamless Access and Seamless Messaging products provide scalable, reliable and extensible mobile Internet, mobile broadband and messaging infrastructure that enable operators to efficiently and flexibly satisfy the explosion of mobile data traffic. Mobixell’s expertise is in adapting and manipulating rich-media content, particularly for mobile messaging and video, and in providing advanced mobile Web 2.0 and mobile advertising solutions. 
The objective in combining the two technologies is to deliver a next generation, intelligent mobile Internet platform. The companies say their joint solution will address the challenges for mobile operators in dealing efficiently with the explosion of data traffic, particularly video, and will allow them to further monetize data and messaging services.
Both Mobixell and 724 Solutions count hundreds of mobile operators among their customers, including many Tier-1 mobile operators in Europe, North America and APAC, including Verizon Wireless, Vodafone, Orange, Swisscom and Turkcell. The combined company intends to continue to partner with its strong OEM channels and system integrators such as IBM, Motorola, Alcatel-Lucent, NSN, Huawei, Ericsson, Comverse and many others.
“The recent explosion in mobile data offers a challenge and an opportunity for mobile operators,” says Mobixell CEO, Amir Aharoni. “A challenge in terms of optimizing the usage level for bandwidth hungry applications, such as rich-media and video, but more importantly an opportunity to capitalize on the growing revenue potential of mobile data and compensate for the reduction in voice revenues. 
“The combination of expertise and technology between Mobixell and 724 Solutions uniquely positions us to tackle this issue and allow mobile operators to improve the return on their infrastructure investment in the burgeoning mobile Internet traffic, expected by industry specialists to grow 66 fold by 2013”.
commitment – with a broader set of resources and value to meet their needs”.
The combined company will be unveiling the joint vision and showcasing its extended offering at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, from 15 - 18 February in Hall 1, stand 1A23.

Opera Buys AdMarvel

Opera Software has acquired mobile advertising firm AdMarvel. Opera says the  acquisition will enable it to expand its portfolio of products and services to include highly scalable ad monetization services for Opera-branded mobile products and services offered by mobile operators and content partners.
AdMarvel works with a broad set of constituents in the advertising ecosystem to improve the performance of mobile advertising. The company was founded in 2006. It strives to make mobile advertising an open ecosystem through better transparency of performance and simpler management of ad traffic to optimize revenue. AdMarvel’s suite of services is designed to put publishers, developers and mobile operators in control of performance, and enables ad networks, agencies and brands to deliver better results.
“In our fast-growing industry, mobile advertising represents an interesting long-term revenue opportunity,” says Opera CEO, Lars Boilesen. “Every month, nearly 50 million people access the web using Opera on their mobile phones and together with AdMarvel, we think we can play an important role in the evolution of mobile advertising.”

Partner Selects Streamezzo for iPhone TV App

Partner Communications Company, the Israeli mobile communications operator, has selected Streamezzo’s software products and professional services to develop, deploy and run its interactive Live TV application for the iPhone.
“We were looking for a fast and effective way to deliver interactive Mobile TV to our future iPhone subscribers” says Ron Lev, Head of Product Marketing and Handsets at  Partner Communications. “We had a proven track record of success in Mobile TV with Streamezzo, so we could trust their ability in facing this new challenge. Thanks to their know-how and reactivity we are now offering a complete and competitive Mobile TV service to our customers, with a state-of-the-art user experience.”

Granath Takes Greystripe Sales Role

Mobile ad network Greystripe has appointed mobile and digital ad sales veteran Kevin Granath as Vice President of Sales. Granath will be responsible for growing Greystripe’s US sales team in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Chicago, and developing ad sales strategy and tactics.
Granath brings over 20 years of experience working in mobile and digital ad sales to Greystripe. For the past two years, he has served as Senior Vice President, Sales and Business Development for ad network Sportgenic, managing a network of more than 750 properties and selling to major clients including Nike, Pfizer, Gatorade and Philips.
Prior to Sportgenic, Granath was Co-founder and Vice President, Account Development, for Ansible Mobile, a joint venture between Interpublic Group and Velti, where he was responsible for all revenue and strategic direction for both sales and business development teams, and worked on General Motors, Johnson & Johnson, Microsoft and Verizon.
“Kevin has a proven track record of surpassing revenue goals and developing strategic positioning in extremely competitive market segments,” says Greystripe CEO, Michael Chang. “With a trusted sales leader like Kevin at the helm, our network will continue to expand and exceed our goals during this period of explosive growth in mobile advertising.”

Improve Digital Launches Mobile Platform

Improve Digital is launching an integrated mobile offering to enable publishers to maximise income from their mobile ad inventory. The online ad revenue optimisation firm enables premium publishers in the UK and Europe to increase takings by between 50 and 300%. The new platform, which is enabled by technology developed by Improve Digital's US partner, Pubmatic, will extend these benefits to mobile.
The company says the move is in response to the rapid growth of the mobile advertising market. According to figures released bu the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) in 2009, a total of￡28.6 million was spent on mobile in 2008, almost double the previous year’s spend. Looking ahead, a recent study by GroupM forecast that global mobile advertising spend will increase by 19% to $3.3 billion (£2.2 billion) in 2010.
Improve Digital’s platform connects to the optimal mix of mobile ad networks according to publishers’ content, audience, and brand safety requirements. It decides in real-time which mobile ad network can best monetise each impression and select the highest paying ad network. The platform also benefits from the same brand control capabilities that protect Improve Digital’s web publishers from unwanted ads, channel conflict, and ad latency issues. Mobile-specific data points such as device, user location, and user demographics are considered as part of the ad network and exchange selection process to maximise publisher revenue. And publishers can manage and review comprehensive reporting and analytics from one consolidated dashboard that tracks both their web and mobile ad sales.
“While the consumption of mobile content has grown exponentially, particularly with the iPhone and Android platforms, the ability to monetise the mobile web has become increasingly difficult for premium publishers,” says Rajeev Goel, Co-founder and CEO of PubMatic. “Our integrated mobile solution gives publishers the ability to take full advantage of their highly lucrative mobile ad inventory by simplifying the process by which they manage and select the most effective ads for their mobile web sites and applications.”

RingRing Deal Based on "Perfect Synergy" says Amobee

As exits go, this must rank as one of the faster ones. Just a year and four months after we covered the launch of RingRing Media, the company has been sold to Amobee Media Systems for an undisclosed sum, though a figure around the $20 million (£12 million) mark has been rumoured. In an interview with Mobile Marketing Magazine this morning, Amobee CEO Zohar Levkovitz, said the company was impressed with RingRing from the first time it met them.
“We met for the first time in September 2009, and it was clear from that first meeting that the synergy between the two companies was almost perfect,” says Levkovitz. “So we checked them out further, and that was a very quick and effective process.”
This synergy comes from the fact that Amobee is a large vendor of mobile advertising inventory on behalf of mobile operators - it also counts Vodafone and Telefónica among its investors - while RingRing connects Amobee to the demand and the advertisers. The two companies say they now aim to create the world’s largest mobile advertising exchange, connecting publishers to advertisers through the mobile channel.
“Big media buys on mobile can be a nightmare,” says Levkovitz. “It’s an almost impossible mission sometimes, where you have to call Vodafone in one country, Orange in another, Telefónica in another, and then go out and find other publishers as well, and large media buyers just can’t do it. RingRing have taken the pain out of this process, and the joint company will have other solutions to make the buying experience even simpler.”
RingRing Media Co-founder Ben Tatton-Brown says everyone at the firm is over the moon with the deal.
“We’re ecstatic and excited, we feel like kids in a toy store,” he says. “We have grown very quickly in a short period of time. The business was founded in 2008, we were profitable after month 11, and we have never looked back, with revenues now in excess of $2 million per month.
“It’s a great deal for us, like two pieces of a jigsaw coming together because the two companies complement each other so well,” he continues. “We have the demand and the client relationships and the budgets and Amobee has the best ad-serving technology in the world. We have been busy building our ad exchange which has now reached 4 billion ads per month, and we now have a combined goal to create the world’s largest mobile ad exchange. In fact, with our 4 billion impressions a month and Amobee’s multiple billions we are already bigger than AdMob.”
But Tatton-Brown is keen to stress that going forward, it's business as usual for the company.
“We remain 100% committed to how we can benefit our clients, advertisers and publishers; we have their best interests at heart,” he says. “We will continue to buy inventory on other networks like AdMob, Quattro and Millennial. The deal does not change anything with regard to our day-to-day business.”

Amobee Buys RingRing

Amobee Media Systems is to acquire mobile media firm RingRing Media. Amobee says the acquisition brings it one step closer to fulfilling its long-term vision of creating the industry’s largest mobile advertising exchange, dedicated to connecting publishers, advertising agencies and brands to premium inventory in real-time, on a global scale. Amobee’s customers include some of the largest mobile operator networks, including Telefonica and Vodafone Group.
Based in London and co-founded by Ben Tatton-Brown and Harry Dewhirst, RingRing Media has quickly earned a healthy reputation as a mobile media specialist, representing some of the largest brands in the world and exchanging over 4 billion impressions per month.
The RingRing Exchange is the world’s first mobile advertising platform dedicated to connecting top tier mobile advertisers, media buying agencies and local and global ad networks with leading mobile publishers, operators and application developers to maximize yield for sellers and improve campaign performance and ROI.
“This acquisition solves an industry issue,” says Amobee CEO Zohar Levkovitz. By leveraging the RingRing Exchange, we are able to streamline the process and connect supply and demand using the best technology on the market. “In doing so, we will be able to reduce the friction associated with today’s mobile media buying and offer a more integrated mobile advertising experience to our customers.”
Amobee says the acquisition will make it easier for mobile advertisers and mobile publishers to co-exist, helping sellers monetize mobile display inventory and giving buyers advanced targeting tools to access to the broadest possible reach at the best possible price through one single buy.
“Amobee saw value in our people, technology and a deep understanding of the market,” says RingRing Co-founder Ben Tatton-Brown, who will remain as Managing Director of RingRing Media. “Amobee and RingRing Media make an excellent match, creating a gold-standard end-to-end mobile advertising solution that enables brands, advertising agencies and publishers to achieve the greatest return from mobile.”
The acquisition is subject to certain closing conditions and is expected to be completed in the first quarter.

InMobi Hires Google Exec as Europe MD

Mobile ad network InMobi has unveiled plans today to provide local European support to publishers and advertisers under the leadership of Rob Jonas, former Google and Yahoo! executive.
Since launching its Mobile Ad Network product in Europe in the Summer of 2009, InMobi has experienced rapid growth and is now serving over 500 million mobile advertising impressions monthy across all major European markets. To capitalise on this success, Jonas has joined InMobi as Managing Director Europe, bringing with him deep experience in high-growth technology businesses that includes both start-ups and public companies across Europe, the US and Asia.
“I was attracted to InMobi by the phenomenal talent and success of the existing team, combined with their desire to build a truly global business in the fastest growing digital sector of this new decade,” says Jonas. “Many factors are finally converging in Europe, which will result in significant growth in the use of mobile technology, with advertising being both a driver and beneficiary of this growth.”
Jonas joins InMobi from Google where he was a Director of Strategic Partnerships for EMEA, with responsibility for identifying, closing, and managing some of Google’s largest commercial relationships in the region. Before Google, he was at Yahoo! Europe, having joined through the acquisition of Overture Europe in 2003. He was also a founding member of idealab! Europe, where he worked with multiple idealab! portfolio companies expanding into Europe. Over the last 13 years, he has worked in roles encompassing sales, strategy, product and business development, M&A and general management. At InMobi, Jonas will be responsible for expanding the company’s business in Western and Eastern Europe.
“Since our launch in Europe only five months ago, InMobi’s growth has surpassed expectations, with the UK now one of our top five countries,” says InMobi CEO and Founder, Naveen Tewari. “To sustain and capitalise on this growth,we recognise the need for local presence. With his extensive experience, Rob is the right fit to further build the business in Europe and provide our advertisers and partners with the insights and support of a local team. Equally important, our ability to attract and hire a seasoned executive like Rob Jonas is a testament to the strength of our business.”

Fetch Picks Up Five

Mobile media agency Fetch Media, which launched in November 2009 in partnership with cross media agency AdConnection, says it has picked up five accounts in the two months since it launched, and that it expects to be billing £100,000 per month by February. In addition to its own clients, Fetch also services AdConnection’s clients for any mobile related campaign, whether it’s specifically mobile advertising, or simply using the mobile as a response mechanism for a campaign running in other media.
“We’ve seen the position of mobile slowly creep up within our congested media landscape,” says Fetch Media Managing Director, James Connelly. “More sophisticated handsets, better data packages and more 3G coverage has played a big role in this, but now we need the agencies to catapult this effective and targeted media solution into the place it deserves. Conversion rates and targeting capabilities far outweigh any other media; we just need to hit critical mass in terms of mobile Internet usage."

Smaato Thinking

Mobile advertising firm Smaato invited mobile experts from around the world to roundtable discussions in San Francisco and London towards the end of 2009. Some fascinating insights emerged from the discussions, including regional and industry trends, and the things that people are most excited about for 2010.
The thought leaders covered subjects such as what the future holds for mobile advertising; the significant acquisition activities in the industry, including Google's deal with Admob; and the difference between US and European VCs.
Smaato CEO and Co-founder Ragnar Kruse said: “Great content and apps are coming to phones (from) more and more developers from around the world, which will differentiate those apps further. One of the things were most excited about for 2010 is continuing to work with those great companies and helping them to monetize and standardize on advertising, so it's a scalable business model across multiple countries and regions.
One of the heated talking points was around the app explosion, how the definition of an app may evolve, and how many more apps will we see in 2010, with estimates ranging from 250,000 to 1 million, a figure advanced by Smaato CMO and Co-founder Harald Neidhardt, and supported by Magnus Jern, CEO of mobile agency, Golden Gekko. 
“Based on the fact there's more and more automatic tools helping people create apps, it could be in the millions. Also what do you class as an app? Is a book a mobile app? Because in 2010 there will probably be around a million books available to download to your phone," said Jern.
The London discussion was recorded by Intruders.tv and highlights of the roundtable can be seen here, with extended coverage on Smaatos’s blog here.

Apple Buys Quattro Wireless

No official word yet from Apple, but it seems that Quattro Wireless is a little keener to share with the world the news that it has been acquired by the company. A statement on the mobile ad network’s website from Andy Miller, Vice President, Mobile Advertising, Apple (that was quick – Ed), reads:
“We are thrilled to let you know that Apple has acquired Quattro. We want to share with you our excitement about this news and what it means for our customers.
“We have built our business by enabling advertisers to reach the right consumers across the mobile web and in applications. We remain focused on delivering more engaging, relevant and useful ads to mobile devices, and improving the measurement and execution of digital campaigns. Together with Apple, we look forward to developing exciting new opportunities in the future that will benefit our customers.
“For now, the offerings and services you receive from Quattro Wireless will not change. We will continue to operate the Quattro Wireless network across all devices and platforms. Your client and support teams will remain the same, and you can continue to expect the world-class service we are proud to deliver to our customers.
We look forward to working with you during this exciting time.”
We’ll bring you more details as soon as we have them.

Statattack

It’s a good day for stats. First, Apple has revealed that more than 3 billion apps have now been downloaded from its App Store by iPhone and iPod touch users worldwide in less than 18 months since its launch.
“Three billion applications downloaded in less than 18 months - this is like nothing we’ve ever seen before,” says Apple CEO, Steve Jobs. “The revolutionary App Store offers iPhone and iPod touch users an experience unlike anything else available on other mobile devices, and we see no signs of the competition catching up anytime soon.”
There’s more good news for Apple with the release of stats from AdMob that show that iPod Touch usage more than doubled in the UK on Friday 26 December, as users got to grips with their new gadgets. But the AdMob stats also reveal rapid growth in worldwide requests from Android devices, with the Motorola Droid is now the leading Android handset. Key findings from AdMob research include:

• iPod touch daily unique users grew by 124% in the UK on 26 December, compared to average daily unique users of the week before Christmas.
• Worldwide iPod touch daily unique users grew by 57% on 26 December, compared to average daily unique users of the week before Christmas.
• Ad requests from iPod touch handsets increased 96% on 26 December, compared to the daily average from the week prior.
• Ad requests from iPhone handsets increased by 12%  over the same period.
• Worldwide requests from Android devices increased 97% from October to December.
• AdMob received over 1 billion ad requests from Android devices in December ‘09.
• The Motorola Droid is already the leading Android handset in the AdMob network, generating 30% of requests in December.
• In October, 98% of Android requests came from HTC devices. In December, 56% of requests were from HTC devices, 39% from Motorola devices, and 5% from Samsung.
• The US leads Android adoption. 90% of Android traffic was in the US in December, up from 84% in October.

Jumbuck Selects InMobi

Mobile ad network InMobi has revealed that it has been selected by Jumbuck Entertainment, which provides community messaging applications to mobile operators, as its mobile advertising partner for its mobile community in Australia. Jumbuck offers premium on-deck Telstra inventory for InMobi’s advertisers. Since the launch of the relationship in August 2009, InMobi says it has delivered the highest mobile advertising payouts of any provider in the region.
“InMobi’s expertise in local mobile advertising has exceeded our expectations by delivering higher revenues,” says Jumbuck SVP Sales and Marketing, Ted Verani. “This increases our confidence in InMobi (and) reaffirms that they were the right partner for our ad inventory in Australia.”
Jumbuck has a global distribution footprint, with a network of over 100 operators globally and a community in excess of 15 million users. InMobi says it is now the largest mobile advertising network outside of the US. InMobi’s services are live in Asia, Africa, Australia, the Middle East and Europe.

Apple to Buy Quattro?

Rumours are circulating that Apple is set to announce the acquisition of mobile ad network Quattro Wireless for $275 million (£172 million). Google pipped Apple to the acquisition of rival network AdMob late last year. If the reports are true, the purchase would signal Apple’s intention to grab a slice of the mobile advertising market. Quattro Wireless’ clients include P&G, Ford, NetFlix, Time Inc., Visa and Disney. We have asked Apple for the official line on the story, but nio response as yet.
Google, meanwhile, is set to unveil its first Smartphone, the Nexus One, at an Android press event later today. Made by HTC, which also made the first Android handset, the G1, the phone runs on Qualcomm’s 1GHz Snapdragon CPU from Qualcomm, and sports a 5 megapixel camera, proximity sensor and accelerometer, plus wi-fi.

Ad-funded Fun

David Murphy catches up with Warwick Hill, CEO of ad-funded video provider 3rd Space

DM: So what’s the big idea Warwick?

WH: We provide free mobile video services to mobile subscribers. The clips are sponsored, which means the operator can offer them for free, and there are no integration or deployment costs to the operator. The 3rd Space platform automatically tailors video delivery for all types of mobile phones, and drives revenue for mobile operators, brand advertisers and content owners, on the basis of cost per mobile view.

DM: How long has the service been running?

WH: Our first deployment, with Reliance in India, launched on 15 October. In the first month, we sent out 1.1 million texts to drive people to the portal. That generated 285,000 unique visitors, and they averaged seven page views per visit, which equated to 1.8 million page impressions and 2.5 video views per visit. There were 465,000 downloads in that first month and 654 different handsets used the platform.

DM: So how many videos are there to look at?

WH: We launched with 90, and we are in the process of adding another 250, mainly Bollywood content. We have taken existing content and clipped it down for mobile. So we have fashion catwalks, Bollywood songs from shows and cartoons, and we will soon be launching mobisodes of the Indian version of ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire’ presented by Shahrukh Khan, who is a huge Bollywood star. 

DM: And how is the inventory sold to advertisers?

WH: It’s sold on a cost per mobile view basis. The revenue goes to the operator and we take a share of it.

DM: So if the advertiser is paying per download, can they put a limit on the number of downloads to cap their spending?

WH: Yes. It can be done campaign by campaign. You upload a video and put the data and download parameters in the system, and it will predict when the budget will run out and send the advertiser an alert to warn them that the budget is almost used up, and ask them if they want to allocate more funds to it if the campaign is going well.
Then the system takes the video, renders it around 30 different ways to cover off different formats and extensions, GSM or CDMA, different operating systems and quality parameters, so that whatever handset it is viewed on, the video is rendered to the highest value it can take.

DM: And what about targeting?

WH: Yes, we can target by content genre, time of day, day of week, there are lots of different parameters we can use.
 
DM: So what form do the ads take? Are we talking pre-roll videos?

WH: Yes, pre-roll advertising of 15-20 seconds duration, with a post-roll call to action to encourgae the user to interact with the advert and enter into the promotions.
 
DM: And what sort of advertisers are you talking to?

WH: There’s a variety, including a drinks brand, fast food chain, and financial services companies. 

DM: So you’re up and running with Reliance in India. Are there any more deployments in the offing?

WH: Yes, we will soon be launching with Warid and WorldCall in Pakistan. That’s a large cable TV company with its own mobile operator.

DM: Anything in the UK?

WH: We will also be launching mobile video services with a new UK Hutchison 3 MVNO client in January 2010 called Simfinity with their ‘Live Life in 3G’ launch campaign.

DM: Why is there not more of this type of activity in the UK, do you think?

WH: It’s very hard work trying to deal with the UK operators. Their typical attitude is, ‘We’ll do it when we are ready and give the subscribers what they want when we want to give it’. There has to be a culture change and until that happens, we are happy working with operators in emerging markets, where there is much less resistance to rationalise costs and share technology assets. 
If you take an operator like Warid, they are a smaller operator with around 14 million subscribers, so to compete with bigger operators like Reliance with 95 million subscribers, they need to be more dynamic and fleet of foot to roll out services that the bigger guys would take longer to deploy. So for them, someone like us who sits in the middle and operates an outsourced, cloud-based portal providing entertainment services, delivering millions of assets in a cost effective manner with 100% up-time is very appealing.

DM: So how big an integration task is it at the network end?

WH: The integration with the operator’s network is minimal, about 30 minutes work. They have to configure the WAP gateways to pass the MSISDN (the mobile number) through to us to track and profile what the user does on the portal then provide us the WAP gateway IPs and we then block anyone who’s not from within that IP address range so only our client’s customers can access it, and that’s just about it.

MobGold Strikes Gold

MobGold, which provides platforms for mobile advertising and mobile transaction solutions, has announced that Fast Global Investments, an expansion-stage venture capital firm, has made a strategic $12 million (£7.4 million) investment in the company's series B round of financing. The new investment has been planned for product development, marketing and market expansion. The company forms strategic partnerships in North America, Europe, Asia and Africa, with access to over 150 network operators and 500 million mobile users around the world.
“MobGold has made huge strides over the past year to solidify its position as a leading mobile advertising company," says MobGold CEO and President, Alan Chang. “Global Investments' venture in MobGold is strategically significant for the industry at large, and it validates the efforts we've made to make MobGold the thriving company it is today."
MobGold develops and operates MobGold Network, a mobile advertising network and mobile transaction solution. The network enables publishers, network operators, web portals and mobile phone retailers to monetize their mobile traffic, while at the same time allowing advertisers to market their products and services.

AdMob Releases November Metrics Report

Mobile ad network AdMob has released its November 2009 Mobile Metrics Report. The report examines the rise of Smartphones, the global growth of the iPhone, and the immediate impact of new Android devices
Two major trends for 20009 identifed in the report are the growing share of requests from Smartphones, and the increasing use of wi-fi. In November 2009 in the US, Smartphones accounted for 48% of mobile Web and application requests, up from 31% in November 2008.  Wi-fi usage has also taken off, with 24% of requests in the US coming in over a wi-fi network in November 2009, compared to 8% in November 2008. A new class of devices that are not phones, but that the ability to connect to the Internet over wi-fi, such as the iPod touch, Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP), and Nintendo DSi gained traction in 2009.
The report also examines growth in unique iPhone and iPod touch users since January 2009, finding more rapid growth outside of the US. In November 2009, 50% of unique users were located outside of the US, up from 39% in January 2009. Of its top markets, Apple devices experienced the strongest percentage growth in Japan, France, and Australia in 2009.
The launch of new Android devices in the second half of 2009 has accelerated the growth of the platform. Six months ago, a single Android device, the HTC Dream (G1), generated 92% of Android traffic, while in November 2009, the same device accounted for only 37% of requests. The Motorola Droid, HTC Magic, and HTC Hero generated 22%, 21% and 9% of Android requests worldwide in November 2009, respectively.
Key findings from the report include:
55% of ad requests in the US came from devices with wi-fi capability, up from only 19% a year earlier.
The Top five US devices based on wi-fi requests generated were the iPod touch, iPhone, Sony PSP, HTC Dream (G1), and Motorola Droid.
36% of iPhone traffic in the US was over wi-fi, considerably higher than other wi-fi-capable devices. Less than 10% of traffic from the major Android devices came over wi-fi.
The iPhone accounted for 71% and the iPod touch for 29% of total unique users from Apple devices. 
Android generated 27% of the requests from Smartphones in the US in November 2009, up from 20% in October 2009.  
88% of requests from Android devices came from the US in November 2009. The second largest Android market is the UK with 4% of requests.
You can access the full report, as well as previous months’ reports, here.

YOC Sees UK Ad Growth

Mobile marketing agency YOC has revealed that monthly page impressions on its UK media network have increased by 41% since June 2009. The network is now serving more than 240 million page impressions each month. The company’s growth in the UK means that the YOC UK media network now represents almost half of YOC’s overall European media network, which receives over 500 million monthly page impressions.
The latest addition to the UK media network is innerActive, an audience-publisher, aggregating mobile in-applications and in-games inventory across many developers and publishers, and directing it to premium ad sales partners. YOC is working with innerActive to provide brands and advertisers with in-game and in-app ads in over 50 ad-ready games available from various storefronts, including Nokia Ovi, Fox Mobile, MTN, Vivid Games, Herocraft and C4M. 
Since its launch in July 2008, YOC UK has signed a range of leading publishing houses, media companies and online portals to its media network. innerActive will sit alongside other publishers including 123play.com, GetJar, PC Advisor, Macworld, Pistonheads, What Car, Stuff.tv, Auto Car and Peperonity.
 “To have increased the monthly page impressions on our UK media network by 41% is a fantastic achievement and a great high for YOC to end the year on,” says Christian Louca, UK Managing Director at YOC. “With us, advertisers can be certain that whoever they want to reach, whatever their target message and no matter what their chosen mechanism, they can get the very best value from their mobile spend.”

Mobiclix Selects Aster Data Analytics Solution

Mobile ad exchange Mobiclix has selected Aster Data’s Aster nCluster Cloud Edition on Amazon Web Services (AWS) to deliver sophisticated analytics. Mobiclix will use Aster’s scalable data analysis and data management platform to enhance its targeted mobile advertising platform with statistical analysis, ad placement optimization, and improved audience targeting to allow developers to maximize ad revenues and advertisers to increase campaign performance.
According to  Aster Data, Aster Data Version 4.0, a MPP Data-Application Server, is the first massively parallel data warehouse that fully runs applications inside ,enabling ultra-fast, deep data analysis on massive data scales. 
The company adds that Aster nCluster Cloud Edition is the first and only MPP data warehouse to bring Online Precision Scaling to the Cloud, allowing companies to scale their systems on-the-fly without downtime. It provides maximum flexibility in scaling the data warehouse through one-click provisioning to increase or decrease storage or compute power across multiple functional tiers (e.g., query, loading, export, etc.) independently to meet workload requirements.
Mobclix also chose to work with Aster Data because of the company’s patent-pending SQL-MapReduce framework which makes it easy to use parallel processing power for ultra-fast data analysis.
“Mobclix needed a database with unlimited scalability and the horsepower for real-time predictive analysis and behavioral targeting to ensure we serve ads from the highest paying network at any given moment,” says Shankar Radhakrishnan, Data Architect at  Mobclix. “Aster nCluster Cloud Edition is the only data warehouse on AWS that allowed us to update our analytics environment for the next stage of our business - letting us store, scale, and process terabytes of complex data in the Cloud, quickly and at a low cost.”
By running analytics inside Aster Data’s MPP data warehouse, customers can achieve significantly faster and deeper data analysis on large data sets. Aster Data’s SQL-MapReduce in particular allows Mobclix to load semi-structured data into the Aster Data platform and parse out useful information into structured data. Previously this process took place outside the database using a separate infrastructure. By pushing this step to the Cloud, Mobclix is able to make key data usable much faster, letting clients explore data in near real-time.

Sofialys Launches Mobile Adbox for Agencies

Mobile advertising firm Sofialys has launched the Mobile Adbox for Agencies, its open ad serving and ad management solution for media agencies.
Sofialys notes that mobile Internet usage has almost quadrupled across most of the European market over the last 18 months and consequently, there are more opportunities for brands to communicate with end users. As a result, an increasing number of media agencies have been looking for the right solution to integrate mobile as part of their clients’ marketing mix.
According to Julien Oudart, VP Sales & Marketing at Sofialys: “Big advertiser budgets are in the hands of media agencies, therefore the ability of those agencies to manage campaigns through an easy-to-use and high-performance ad server is one of the keys to industry development. Our experience shows that brands and agencies are eager to embrace the mobile advertising opportunity; they just require the right tools to plan, target and report on campaigns in order to start spending more of their resources on mobile media.”
The Mobile Adbox for Agencies manages all campaign publication, and also gives agencies the ability to amend the planning and forecast the available inventory for an upcoming campaign,  and to target and track according to user profile, location, country, handset and type of site or application for each advertiser client.
The Sofialys ad server also guarantees access to all the major web ad servers on the market today so that agencies can manage all their web and mobile campaigns from one tool.

InMobi Celebrates African Success

InMobi says that it is now serving over 650 million mobile ad requests per month in S. Africa, making it the largest mobile advertising network in the country. InMobi’s service offerings have also been expanded to other countries in Africa, including Kenya, Nigeria and Egypt, which the company says are beginning to show a significant growth in mobile advertising.
With the upcoming Football World Cup 2010, InMobi is predicting an explosion in mobile advertising and brand engagement, since nothing connects Africa quite like football. Under the first ever mobile rights distribution project for the World Cup, operators around the world will stream all 64 matches live to mobile handsets. Users will also be able to receive highlights and updates to their phones on a near-live basis. In his address during the World Cup ceremony in Berlin, South African President Thabo Mbeki said that the 2010 FIFA World Cup S. Africa would be the first event of this magnitude where the world would be able to participate via their mobile handsets. InMobi says it is gearing up for the occasion. The company is also announcing a partnership with a S, African advertising agency, MobiClicks, to engage S. Africa with mobile advertising.
“Our partnership with InMobi has been very fruitful in the region,” says MobiClicks CEO, Shaun Rosen. “InMobi has been with us at every step and has ensured that our performance never dips. We believe 2010 will be another banner year for mobile advertising in S. Africa and believe InMobi is a solid partner for advertisers looking to reach mobile consumers in the region.”  
According to InMobi, the S. African market is made up of very progressive users, who are highly engaged on their mobile devices and respond well to mobile advertising, as evidenced by the clickthrough rates and advertiser return on investment. S. Africa has close to 10 million mobile Internet users, and this number is expected to grow to 15 million by 2013. InMobi says it now aims to grow the entire mobile ecosystem in S. Africa by bringing global players into this market.
“The success of S. Africa is now spreading to the rest of Africa and has shown some promising results in countries like Kenya, Nigeria and Egypt,” says Abhay Singhal, Head of Global Ad Sales at InMobi. “It is perceived that mobile is now accelerating the economic growth of the entire continent. The World Cup 2010 will be a catalyst for mobile advertising in Africa, and we’re positioned to lead the market and connect brands and publishers to this emerging market.”

YOC Takes Archant Titles Mobile

Archant, the UK's largest independently-owned regional media business, has appointed YOC to create mobile sites for three of its key titles, the Norwich Evening News, Ilford Recorder and Norwich City FC fanzine, The Pink’Un.
YOC is developing bespoke mobile sites for Archant and helping the publisher to develop its digital strategy by embracing the mobile channel and offering its readers access to the regional papers’ content from any mobile phone. The mobile sites will enable Archant to extend their reach to a new mobile audience and create new revenue streams amongst local advertisers.
This is Archant’s first move into the world of mobile, taking the successful business model deployed at a national level and focusing on local businesses and advertisers to unlock a new regional mobile advertising market.
In the two weeks since he sites went live, Suffolk brewery Adnams has sponsored the entire m.pinkun.com site and regional department stores such as Palmers in Great Yarmouth, have launched exclusive money-off vouchers for Archant’s mobile users.
“With YOC, Archant are now leading the way in harnessing the power of mobile for local audiences – both readers and advertisers,” says Tim Youngman, Head of Digital Marketing at Archant. “Our mobile sites have already struck a chord with local businesses and brands seeking return on their advertising investment, and we’re already looking to roll out this mobile strategy with YOC across other titles in our portfolio.”
YOC says that the partnership also opens up a new market for itself among small and medium sized business, using its relationship with Archant to help a broader range of companies to understand the potential of mobile.
“The personal, interactive nature of mobile makes it an ideal channel for publishers to connect with their readers,” says YOC Managing Director, Oli Roxburgh. “We’re relishing the opportunity to work with Archant to build a commercially viable mobile business for regional publishing from day one, by engaging and partnering with local businesses. Our heritage in both designing and building mobile sites and managing ad inventory mean that we are ideally placed to make this a success for Archant.”
To access the Archant mobile sites, visit m.eveningnews24.co.uk, m.ilfordrecorder.co.uk and m.pinkun.com

Admoda Launches In-app Ad Units

Mobile advertising firm Admoda has launched new ad units for iPhone and Android applications, and to celebrate, all app developers to sign up will receive 100% payout for the first 30 days from when they start publishing.
Admoda has been profitable for three years now and says it has seen huge growth through 2009 on the mobile web, with over 2 billion ad requests per month, including its Adultmoda brand. The launch of the ad units for applications will extend this reach further, the company says.
Admoda says it has launched the in-app ad solution to improve on what it sees as the problems with current solutions, such as inappropriate ads, low pay outs, and low fill rates resulting in low eCPMs.
The 100% payout offer is open to app developers who sign up between now and the end of February 2010. App developers will receive 100% payout for the first 30 days from when they start publishing Admoda in-app ads.

Out There Media Seeks Grecian Earnings

Mobile advertising firm Out There Media has signed a strategic partnership with mobile operator COSMOTE in Greece, offering advertisers targeted access to almost 100% of mobile subscribers in the country.  
COSMOTE, a member of OTE Group, has over 21 million customers across four countries, including Greece, where it is the leading operator. COSMOTE will launch mobile advertising within the first quarter of 2010. The service will initially be available through the COSMOTE mobile portal, ‘COSMOTE my view’. Out There Media says that other channels, including SMS, MMS and mobile broadband, will soon be developed, with the aim of delivering an end-to-end, cross-channel advertising medium.
“Our partnership with COSMOTE is of strategic significance for the sector as a whole and signals a new chapter for the future of mobile advertising in Greece,” says Out There Media CEO, Kerstin Trikalitis.

InMobi Moves Into Profit

InMobi has revealed that it is now serving 7.5 billion monthly mobile ad impressions and says it has become the first profitable independent global mobile ad network. InMobi says its growth has followed a different path than most advertising companies, as it began in India but has now expanded worldwide to 30 countries.
Asia enjoys the highest number of ad impressions for InMobi, with 4,950 million impressions each month. InMobi says that this is the highest number of ad impressions for any network in the region.  
Africa is responsible for 900 million monthly impressions, while impressions in S. America have grown by 1306% in the last six months. InMobi launched in Europe in August 2009, but already, the company says, it is the number two network in the region, with 850 million monthly impressions.
“Achieving this milestone is exciting for us not only due to the success of InMobi, but also because it reiterates our belief that mobile advertising is finally coming of age,” says InMobi CEO, Naveen Tewari. “This further renews our determination to help the medium flourish all over the globe. I believe that our expansion strategy of growing in the east and then moving to the west has worked really well for us, as the east has a large population for whom the mobile is the first screen. This has shown that all parts of the world are waking up to the potential of mobile as an advertising channel. We intend to accelerate this cognizance and also help the players leverage the capabilities of the medium.”

Oracle Launches Ad Solution for Mobile Operators

Oracle has announced the launch of Oracle Communications Marketing and Advertising, an application that enables network operators to securely execute targeted mobile advertising and marketing campaigns.
Historically, says Oracle, the effectiveness of mobile advertising has been hampered by advertisers’ inability to deliver targeted offers. By contrast, it says, Oracle Communications Marketing and Advertising changes this direction as “the only application that allows network operators to execute targeted mobile advertising campaigns based on subscribers’ demographic, usage and location information.
“Mobile marketing and advertising is expected to grow significantly in the next several years, and network operators need to stake their claim in this lucrative opportunity area,” says Shira Levine, Directing Analyst, Next-gen OSS and Policy at analyst, Infonetics. “Oracle Communications Marketing and Advertising represents a significant step forward by enabling network operators to develop mobile advertising environments that attract advertisers and ensure their satisfaction.”
The application includes pre-built interfaces and pre-defined templates tailored for a variety of users, including advertisers, ad agencies and publishers; self-service tools that empower advertisers to create campaigns and monitor their effectiveness, while providing network operators secure control over the use of network resources; the ability both to push bulk messages to a large number of subscribers and to integrate advertising into pull messages – responses to subscriber interactions, such as text message voting for a reality TV show; and support for advertising delivery via SMS, MMS and WAP push.
“Oracle is dedicated to driving customer success through innovation,” says Oracle Communications Vice President of Product Marketing, “Dan Ford. “Oracle Communications Marketing and Advertising exemplifies this commitment by addressing the hurdles that have previously prevented widespread adoption of mobile marketing and advertising. With this new application, Oracle helps network operators capitalize on new revenue streams that leverage subscriber data and network resources to provide advertisers with new opportunities for targeted marketing.”

Amobee Awarded Technology Pioneer Status

The World Economic Forum has selected Amobee as a Technology Pioneer 2010. Amobee was evaluated by 58 global technology experts appointed by the World Economic Forum and was recognized for its new unified media system enabling the funding of mobile content and communications through advertising revenues.
To be selected by the Forum, a company must be involved in the development of life-changing technology innovations and have the potential for a long-term impact on business and society. In addition, it must demonstrate visionary leadership and show signs of being a long-standing market leader with proven technology.
Previous Technology Pioneers include Google, Infosys, Mozilla Corporation, and Amyris Biotechnologies. This is the 11th anniversary of the Technology Pioneers program of the Forum, which aims to recognize companies at the forefront of technology and innovation.
“We are proud to have won this award recognizing Amobee’s technology as it underscores our efforts to deliver game-changing solutions to the mobile advertising industry,” says Amobee CEO, Zohar Levkovitz. “We remain committed to serving the mobile needs of global operators, as well as top brands and media buyers that are reaching out to mobile users with targeted advertising.”
The World Economic Forum is an independent international organization committed to improving the state of the world by engaging leaders in partnerships to shape global, regional and industry agendas. Incorporated as a foundation in 1971, and based in Geneva, Switzerland, the World Economic Forum is impartial and not-for-profit; it is tied to no political, partisan or national interests.

More About O2 More

We’re pleased to report that O2 has finally responded to our request for more information about the O2 More advertising service. To be fair, once the PRs got involved, it only took just over a day, but it’s a shame our request could not have been passed on to them when we first issued it almost a month ago.
In any event, O2 tell us that it’s too early to say how many people are on the database, since the opt-in process only launched yesterday. Subscribers are being invited to opt in via a marketing campaign to the O2 customer base, including emails, bill inserts and information on the O2 website. They are being incentivised by the promise of offers and deals that are relevant to their interests, and that can save them money. The network says it is targeting both ‘Pay & Go’ and contract customers, but that initially, it will focus its efforts on customers that it knows are interested in existing O2 opt-in programmes, such as Priority Ticketing and Top up Surprises.
O2 says it will use a wide range of information to profile customers and segment the database for advertisers. This includes age, gender, location, phone usage (i.e. have they travelled abroad recently and to which country), and mobile Internet usage. This is then matched with the preferences the customer selects when they register and opt-in to O2 More. The customer information O2 uses to profile subscribers is made clear to them when they opt in.
The operator says it is speaking to a wide range of brands and has 50 signed up at launch including Cadbury, Adidas, Interflora and Blockbuster. People on the database, says O2, will receive no more than one message per day

Smaato Secures $4.5m

Mobile advertising firm Smaato has closed its second institutional round of funding. Aeris Capital led the $4.5 million (£2.7 million) round, with an undisclosed partner and existing shareholders also participating. The company says the money will be used to grow its global presence.
“Our mission is to give mobile publishers a dependable mobile advertising solution for their worldwide inventory to maximize mobile revenues,” says Smaato CEO, Ragnar Kruse. “We provide an innovative mobile advertising optimization and mediation platform that can deliver ads in more than 215 countries for mobile web and apps. This new round of funding will help us further expand our network of now 33 ad networks globally and continue to provide the best possible choice and service to our customers. We have recently opened our Singapore presence and as a result of the funding we will continue to strengthen our position in other regions."
More than 1,000 publishers have signed up with Smaato as a partner to monetize their content so far and the company says it is managing close to 3 billion ad requests per month. 

Less is More

Now that O2 has officially taken the wraps off O2 More, we have written again to the company to ask them the questions we asked them four weeks ago, namely: 

• How many people are on the database?
• How were they recruited?
• How were they incentivised to join?
• Are they all contract customers, or a mix of contract and non-contract?
• What sort of profiling can you offer brands - age, location etc?
• How are you planning to market the database to brands?
• Are there any limits on the number of marketing messages someone on the database would receive in a given time period?

Having had no response to our emails about the database the first and second time round, who knows whether we’ll get any answers this time, but if and when we do, we’ll we happy to share them with you. Personally, I'm all for this type of up-front, transparent relationship between a network and its customers. So long as the customers know what they are opting in to, then where's the problem? It would just paint a much fuller picture of what the O2 More offering is if the network would fill in the gaps in the story.

David Murphy
Editor

O2 Launches O2 More

O2 has officially unveiled O2 More, which it describes as “a first-of-its-kind scheme in the mobile industry, which will unleash the true potential of mobile advertising for brands”.
According to O2, O2 More takes mobile advertising beyond the banner, delivering highly personalized campaigns for advertisers and giving O2 customers access to a wide range of exclusive and relevant offers from over 50 leading brands at launch.
O2 More is an opt-in programme for O2 customers which matches preference information they give to O2 with data O2 holds on those customers, such as phone usage, location etc. For instance, if a customer says that they are interested in sports and O2 knows they roamed in Switzerland over the winter, a deal on a skiing holiday could be offered to that customer through O2 More. Mobile Marketing Magazine first revealed the existence of the database on 5 November, but since then, the network has repeatedly refused our requests for more information.
At launch, offers will include discounts from high street retailers and restaurants, holiday offers and trials of new services or information about forthcoming launches. Over 50 brands have already signed up to the scheme, including Adidas, Cadbury, Interflora and Blockbuster. In the coming months, O2 says the service will continue to evolve, with new products and services launching which allow advertisers to reach consumers in an efficient and relevant way. Localised solutions are included in the plans.
David Fieldhouse, Mobile Manager at MediaCom, says the O2 More programme represents a “fantastic opportunity” for its clients to provide relevant, personal and anticipated messages to the O2 customer base.
“Previous campaigns run by Mediacom show that personalised messaging delivers strong results for clients,” says Fieldhouse. “The ability to reach huge numbers of opted-in consumers, combined with granular levels of targeting, represents an exciting step forward for the mobile industry.”
O2 customers can sign up to the service and register their preferences at www.o2.co.uk/o2more from tomorrow, and will receive up to one message per day based on these preferences.

O2's Opt-in Revolution. Read

Smaato Extends Mobile Ad Network

Mobile advertising firm Smaato has unveiled regional ad network Madvertise as its 33rd ad network partner. Madvertise is the leading regional ad network in Germany, Austria and Switzerland with a strong mobile website and mobile application publisher network.
“We see this new partnership with Madvertise to be a great added value to our secret sauce in being able to deliver the most far reaching services globally - with relevant, local mobile advertising for our publishers,” says Smaato CEO Ragnar Kruse.
Smaato started building its SOMA (Smaato Open Mobile Advertising) platform as a mobile advertising optimization platform with its first partner Third Screen (now part of AOL) and leading ad network partners like AdMob (now part of Google). It extended the number of partners internationally, including expansion into Asia with partners in India, Singapore, the Philippines, Malaysia and Japan. Smaato currently delivers ads in over 215 countries for mobile web and mobile apps.
The SOMA platform supports all of the most popular handsets, including iPhone, Blackberry, Palm and Android, for both in-application and mobile Internet advertising. SOMA offers connections to over 30 ad networks; automated data collection across networks; eCPM optimization based on live revenue forecasts; manual override of house ads; and dynamic campaign selection.
For ad networks, Smaato offers extended reach (including moving from online ad networks towards mobile); reach across all mobile platforms; and targeting by location, gender, demographics and age, if provided by the publisher.
“With our 33rd partner we have more ad network partners as anybody else in the market, and Smaato provides an iPhone SDK and one API to automatically access publishers inventory to all ad networks connected,” says Kruse. “Our publisher partners do not need a separate agreement with an ad network to get started because one agreement with Smaato provides for all access to the partners ad inventory in over 215 countries.”

AdMob Report Focuses On Mobile Operating Systems

AdMob has released its October 2009 Mobile Metrics Report, which examines the major mobile Operating Systems and the distribution of requests across top devices that run on them. The iPhone, Palm and RIM OSs all run exclusively on devices manufactured by those companies, while the Android, Symbian and Windows Mobile OSs run on devices from a variety of manufacturers.
New devices from RIM are generating an increasing percentage of the total number of requests for the platform,” says AdMob. The recently-launched RIM devices that are gaining traction are the Tour and new versions of the Curve (8900 and 8520). The older 8100 Pearl series has seen its share of RIM traffic steadily decrease, from 28% in April to 16% in October. However, the 8300 Curve series has maintained approximately 44% share over the last six months.
The Android Operating System is a relative newcomer, having turned one year old in October.
Worldwide requests from Android devices increased 5.8 times since April 2009 in the AdMob network. The HTC Dream (G1) has continued to experience strong growth over the past six months, says AdMob, and the launch of new devices is driving significant incremental growth in Android traffic. The Motorola Droid already represented 24% of all Android requests in AdMob's network two weeks after it launched.               Highlights from the October 2009 AdMob Mobile Metrics Report include:

• In October 2009, 70% of iPhone OS requests came from the iPhone while the remaining 30% percent came from the iPod touch.
• In the US, the RIM 8300 Curve and 8100 Pearl series devices have consistently remained in the Top 20 devices over the last two years. In the UK, the 9000 Bold and 8900 Curve have seen strong growth and are now the number 10 and 11 devices, respectively.
• In the US, Android had 20% share of Smartphone traffic, up from 7% six months earlier, and the HTC Magic (myTouch 3G) and HTC Dream were both Top 10 devices. In the UK, the HTC Dream, HTC Magic, and HTC Hero are all Top 10 devices in the AdMob network.
• The Motorola CLIQ has also seen fast pickup since its launch at T-Mobile in the US, and on 18 November, generated 6% of Android traffic.
• The top Symbian and Windows Mobile devices have not changed in 2009 and both platforms have lost Smartphone share. One of Nokia's first touchscreen models, the 5800 XpressMusic, is the one of the few newcomers to the list of Top 20 Symbian devices in 2009.

AdMob’s Mobile Metrics Reports are based on handset and operator data from every ad request in the company’s network of more than 15,000 mobile websites and applications. The monthly reports aggregate this data to provide insights into major trends in the mobile ecosystem. The AdMob share is calculated by the percentage of requests received from a particular handset. It is a measure of relative mobile Web and application usage and does not represent handset sales. You can access the full report here.

GetJar Hands Pay-per-download Brief to YOC

Mobile marketing agency The YOC Group has signed a partnership with independent app store GetJar to offer brands placement and visibility on the store. Building on YOC’s commercial relationships with UK, European and global brands, the partnership will enable YOC to diversify its offering to brands, giving them the opportunity to increase their presence via applications on the GetJar network, visible to over 15 million unique visitors.
The partnership will allow brands to place their application with GetJar, making them accessible to millions of users via more than 1,800 different mobile devices. Brand placement will be sold on a pay-per-download (PPD) basis, providing brands with the opportunity to decide on the level of visibility they want to have in the GetJar community by choosing a price and paying only for the downloads they receive.
“Mobile marketing is no longer simply about creating a mobile portal or running an SMS banner campaign, as brands are now beginning to expand their marketing presence by creating compelling, relevant applications,” says Christian Louca, UK Country Manager and Head of Publishers at YOC. “Through our partnership with GetJar, we can help brands to increase the scale and breadth of their digital marketing presence and reach over 15 million unique visitors accessing the community from thousands of different devices.”
With over 650 million mobile application downloads to date, GetJar joins the YOC media network, alongside publishing houses and media companies including Haymarket, Telegraph Media Group, News International, The Independent and Flirtomatic.

Google's AdMob Deal Analyzed

We’ve spent some of today canvassing opinions from various parts of the mobile marketing business concerning Google’s acquisition of AdMob for $750 million, announced yesterday.
The consensus seems to be that the move is a welcome one, and not just for AdMob. Mick Rigby, Chairman of mobile media and strategy agency Yodel Digital, says he had mixed emotions when he first read about the deal, but concluded that it is a good move.
“AdMob is a great business providing an excellent service and my initial thoughts were that they would completely get swamped by Google and become a faceless monolith,” he says. “In retrospect, however, I think this is both a good move for AdMob and for the mobile business as whole. For AdMob, they will be able to tap into all the global Google relationships and grow rapidly. The mobile advertising business gets a huge shot in the arm of increased credibility. Google has said that in the future it believes it will be making more money from mobile than from the fixed line Internet. In buying AdMob, Google has shown massive commitment to mobile advertising and by the nature of this relationship, it will accelerate the growth of the sector.”
Adhish Kulkarni, Managing Director of B!Digital, says the acquisition is an important step in validating mobile as a sustainable, profitable advertising medium at a time when other mobile advertising brands have exited the market.
“Admob being primarily linked to CPC (cost-per-click) performance marketing still leaves the premium space open - one of the reasons B!Digital recently launched our own mobile advertising marketplace,” says Kulkarni. “Given the rapid expected growth of the medium, we feel there is lots of room for competition to thrive as long as you keep focus. Finally, this move cements Google’s strategic emphasis on mobile, which also means they may be looking to fill other gaps in the mobile advertising marketplace such as SMS marketing, which are today out of scope for Admob.”
Mark Slade, Managing Director of 4th Screen Advertising, also draws a distinction between AdMob’s CPC-based, ad-exchange model, where advertisers can “buy inventory blindly and cheaply on a CPC basis, with the price being dictated by the ad-network provider or buyer” and premium ad networks.
“Using Google’s muscle AdMob will no doubt be able to increase its share of this sector considerably, which means some tough times ahead for many of its direct competitors,” he says. “However, premium mobile ad-networks such as 4th Screen offer advertisers the ability to provide a highly engaging experience that can deliver a precise and targeted campaign at premium inventory, that draws on advanced handset features and an array of mobile marketing techniques.”
Slade concludes that the Google/AdMob deal can only serve to increase the value brands place in mobile advertising per se, and that the industry will experience a benefit at both the CPC and premium ends of the market.
Zohar Levkovitz, Founder and CEO of Amobee, which delivers advertising solutions to mobile operators, says that the move signals to operators developing their own mobile advertising offerings that there is no time for complacency.
“The marriage between Google and Admob is a clear indicator that the mobile advertising industry has a bright future. Industry innovation will also stand to benefit from Google entering the competitive mix,” says Levkovitz. “While operators still own the mobile market in terms of reach, and the subscriber in terms of trust, billing relationships, user demographics and targeting information, it is undeniable that Google’s acquisition is a game changer.
“Nevertheless, there are still challenges to overcome and fragmentation continues to be a stumbling block. In order for mobile advertising to have a strong, viable future, we believe that the solution must be more centralized around the unbeatable assets of the mobile operators. Major brands and media buyers want a one-stop shop solution and access to the operator’s premium inventory. An operator-centric approach will play a key role in making this possible and further accelerate adoption.”
Xen Mendelsohn, Product Marketing Manager at Comverse Mobile Advertising, echoes these views. She says:
“Many of today’s mobile campaigns use mobile display banners offered by mobile ad networks, such as AdMob and others. However, bypassing the operator in the mobile advertising value chain provides advertisers with inferior results.
“Ad networks, like Google Analytics over the web, can provide information about the OS and handset used to display the ad, the amount of time that the ad was displayed, the country, IP address, etc. But they’re unable to provide real information about who the users are and surely no indication of their interests and habits.
“Mobile operators hold key assets of great value that can’t be replicated by any other player, not AdMob or Google or even the two combined. Operators know their users and their interests – information can be tailored accordingly to reduce the risk of spam and irrelevant ads. Operators can also offer incentives such as free or reduced-price mobile services in return for receiving ads on your phone. And operators also have access to more channels than pure mobile internet display ads, from ringback tones, to P2P SMS/MMS, visual voicemail, video etc. The options are almost limitless."
Mendelsohn notes that while many operators have acknowledged the growing activity in the mobile advertising arena and their unique assets, they have been hesitant to jump in with both feet; mostly due to a lack of knowledge of how to turn into a media company that sells ad space.
“The size of the Google AdMob deal shows the advertising web giant sees huge potential in this domain,” she says. “And it will certainly reassure and encourage operators that there is big business for them in the mobile advertising market; especially when the latter are in possession of unique assets that trump the off-deck mobile advertising framework.”
Jo Wall, Mobile Advertising Specialist at Acision, says the purchase of AdMob will strengthen Google’s mobile advertising position, which to date, she feels, has been limited, predominately focusing successfully on mobile search.
“Linking the capabilities of the two companies should produce more innovation within this space, hopefully this will be more than just mobile Internet advertising,” says Wall. “The multi-channel potential from mobile Internet, messaging, on-device, games, applications and more is what makes mobile advertising exciting. However, for mobile advertising to flourish it is critical that privacy, preference and permissions are at the heart of any solution going forward. It will be interesting to see how Google’s Ad Preference Manager will be extended to the AdMob’s Ad Network capabilities to benefit both the advertisers, by providing greater targeting data for more effective campaigns, and the end users by ensuring more relevant ads are received.”
Mark Curtis, CEO of online and mobile dating service Flirtomatic, says the move is very good news for mobile overall.
“I’m not surprised,” says Curtis. “Admob had been very clever at setting up a system that, like Google Adwords, was super easy to use from anywhere in the world to buy placement anywhere in the world. It also marks out how very serious Google is about the mobile space. What I'm hoping for now is innovation in mobile advertising and there is a strong chance Google will drive this.”
And Stephen Upstone, VP Sales Business Development at Velti Plc, says he believes that Google’s investment in AdMob is a strategic play for the Android ecosystem and the ambition to quickly scale Android to become much larger than Apple and, longer term, Nokia’s Symbian.
“The strategic value here is how AdMob will help make revenue flow to application developers and handset manufacturers using the Android Operating System,” says Upstone. “This strategic importance could have had an influence on the valuation in the deal, especially if there was competition from other potential buyers.”
Ben Tatton-Brown, Managing Director of mobile media planning and buying agency RingRing Media, describes the acquisition as “a milestone for our industry, that highlights the potential of the mobile advertising market.”
Tatton-Brown says he believes the valuation is justified regarding the size and the growth of the market.
“I am very confident for the future of mobile advertising,” he says. “Especially since RingRing Media is now spending in excess of $1 million a month buying advertising for our clients and seeing significant month on month growth.”
And Mike Wehrs, CEO and President of the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), says that if there remained any doubters of the value of mobile marketing, the sale of AdMob to Google at this valuation puts those concerns to rest. 
“Mobile marketing and advertising represent unique capabilities for advertisers and marketers and a new level of information access for consumers,” says Wehrs. “These characteristics have shown already the incredible impact on a company's marketing efforts that embracing MMA guidelines and best practices in their Mobile Marketing efforts can have.”
And what do we think? Well for what it’s worth, with no axe to grind and no vested interests, we agree with Mick Rigby that it’s a deal that gives the mobile marketing business increased credibility at a time when there is still much frustration in the air that budgets are still small, brands still ignorant of what mobile can do for them, and the very act of buying mobile media is still far too difficult. As David Fieldhouse, Head of Mobile at media agency Mediacom put it at an event last week:
“When you can spend £1m online in an afternoon and it takes three days to spend £50,000 on mobile, there’s your answer.”

The fact that, despite all this, Google feels that this a market worth being in can only get more brands to take mobile seriously. Perhaps even the mobile operators too. On the subject of which, for those following our attempts to get more information out of O2 about their marketing database of O2 subscribers which they are making available to brands, we followed up our email of last Thursday with another this morning, asking all the same questions. Still no reply, but we’ll share all the details with you as soon as we have them. Perhaps, hopefully, they’re too busy talking to Google.

Footnote:
We’ve received a couple more opinions about Google and AdMob, which we thought were worth sharing.
Sponge CEO Dan Parker says:
“I think this is a game changer. Like many, Google CEO Eric Schmidt has evangelised about mobile for some time, saying he believes it will outgrow internet advertising, which in the UK will over take TV this year.
“To date, the evangelists at media groups, agencies and brands have done little to back their rhetoric. Mobile budgets are modest at best and closer to non-existent at most companies.
Now the smartest and most successful company in new media have backed their rhetoric with action. Google has paid a very big price to get a strong position in mobile. This is not going to go unnoticed by every advertiser, agency and media owner. I believe it will be a landmark event in the growth of our sector.”
And at YOC, Christian Louca, UK Country Manager and Head of Publishers, says Google's acquisition of Admob makes perfect sense. 
“The purchase demonstrates the search engine giant's ambitions extend beyond the desktop and into the mobile space,” says Louca. “Adding mobility is a natural extension of what Google does already.
“The news sends a clear message to any people who might have doubted that mobile ad networks are able to create a sustainable and profitable model. Previous attempts by other players in the market may not have been so successful and somewhat premature, (but) the mobile industry is now in a boom state. Companies such as Google understand the market dynamics. They understand that even the most expert mobile specialists cannot fully appreciate the full potential mobile offers as it is simply too massive. Google is in the best position to keep driving the industry forward whilst being able to unlock its true potential by developing personal, creative and innovative user experiences. This is a big wake-up call for the industry.
“I think we will start to see a significant increase in the speed of the development of the entire market and this is certain to open up opportunities for other investors looking to take part in such an exciting and lucrative industry.”

Google Buys AdMob for $750m

Google is buying mobile ad network AdMob for $750 million (£448 million). AdMob says it is extremely excited about the new partnership and what it means for its publishers. In a statement to publishers, Admob Founder Omar Hamoui says:
“AdMob’s people, products and tools will continue to work to effectively monetize mobile traffic – no interruptions.  Our product and engineering teams will keep building great products for our customers. Our sales team will keep working with our thousands of advertisers to deliver successful campaigns.
“After our deal closes, AdMob will work with Google to accelerate the pace of innovation in mobile and do an even better job for you.”
Hamoui concludes by saying that he believes the deal will benefit the company's developer and publisher partners by:

• Building even more powerful technology and tools to monetize mobile traffic.
• Increasing the effectiveness of display advertising on mobile devices by leveraging Google sales team, infrastructure and relationships.
• Improving the already high level of service and support the company delivers to its publishers.

Mogreet Unveils Mobile Video Marketing Platform

Mogreet, which offers a mobile video messaging platform, has launched the Mogreet Mobile Video Marketing Platform. Mogreet says the platform can deliver short-format videos to more than 200 million US mobile devices, while measuring the effectiveness and ROI of each campaign in real-time. The company adds that its clients routinely experience open rates, video views and clickthrough rates 15 to 25 times higher than other forms of advertising media. And by virtue of the fact that mobile customers react to text messages in 20 seconds on average, brands see results almost instantly. Marketers also benefit from the inherent viral nature of Mogreet Mobile Video Marketing, as mobile messages can easily be shared amongst friends, resulting in five to 10 times additional reach.
“It’1993 all over again, only this time, rather than email, the race is on to harness mobile to build a direct relationship with the end consumer,” says Mogreet CEO, James Citron. “The ability to deliver your message in video to just about every mobile phone in the US, and not just Smartphones with Internet plans, means marketers are not forced to sacrifice reach when they add mobile to their marketing mix.”
Mogreet Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Jay Goss, adds that over 150 million US consumers do not own a Smartphone, and most have never seen a video on their mobile phone. “With Mogreet, we have designed a way to reach these consumers and enable brands to communicate in rich, engaging media, creating an iPhone-like experience across all major networks and phones,” says Goss.
Mogreet is expanding marketers reach by harnessing the power of over four-billion text messages sent each day in the US from consumers of all ages, including adults aged 35 – 44, who now send more texts than they place calls. Mogreet’s platform has been used by leading brands in numerous verticals from hospitality to apparel, retail and entertainment, including four No.1 box office film releases.

Buongiorno Rebrands to B!Digital

Digital marketing and ad agency Buongiorno Marketing Services has rebranded to Buongiorno!Digital (B!Digital). The company says the move aims to address the convergence of mobile and Internet campaigns and reflects the extensive marketing and advertising portfolio that it offers throughout the digital space. B!Digital builds campaigns that integrate mobile, web and social media tactics, matching the consumer’s digital behaviour, all with measurable results. The rebrand will be backed by a €500,000 investment to promote the company across Europe.
The new B!Digital website introduces a mobile advertising performance marketplace, in beta, for B!Digital’s customers. The company says the marketplace is based on premium European inventory that has been aggregated, whilst keeping the B!Digital network quality high. Each advertiser will have a clear range of campaign and budget allocation choices and will be supported by regional sales and account teams to maximise investment.
“The new brand and interactive website represents the best way for us to present our offering to the market, which now needs a variety of options,” says B!Digital UK Managing Director, Adhish Kulkarni. “Companies in the early stages of digital marketing require end-to-end managed services, while more mature players want to build and manage their own campaigns. B!Digital’s website will act as a central point of entry for prospects and clients accessing B!Digital’s portfolio of market offerings.”
B!Digital capitalises on the company’s on-the-ground presence across eight countries (UK, France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Russia, Netherlands and the US), and existing relationship with over 120 telco’s globally to offer international planning and buying capability with local expertise via its network, managed via local account managers and teams.

eBuddy and InMobi Strike Mobile Ad Deal

Mobile and web IM (Instant messaging) service eBuddy has formed a mobuile advertising partnership with mobile ad network InMobi, effective in 12 countries, including the UK, Ireland, France, Spain, Italy, South Africa, Australia and India. The newly formed partnership in these geographies already accounts for over 20% of eBuddy’s total mobile ad revenue. eBuddy says it has struck the deal with InMobi based upon the positive results it has seen working with the company over the past four months.
“We anticipate excellent results from our partnership with InMobi,” says eBuddy CEO, Jan-Joost Rueb. “InMobi’s scale and strength in international markets, combined with eBuddy’s 240% year-on-year mobile IM growth and more than 9 million unique monthly mobile users, lays the foundation for a hugely successful partnership for both companies.”

Out There Updates Mobucks Ad Platform

Mobile advertising firm Out There Media has released version 2.0 of its multi-channel mobile advertising marketplace technology, Mobucks. The new version builds on the success of Mobucks 1.0 and Mobucks AdFund, which have been deployed with several leading mobile operators. Mobucks 2.0 features a series of improvements that have been designed to further facilitate the successful implementation of mobile ad campaigns for both network operators and advertisers, over a unified platform.
According to Out There Media, Mobucks 2.0 features break-through enhancements for optimum campaign set-up and management. It also offers data mining and profiling capabilities for dynamic customer profiling and targeting. An improved reporting structure provides detailed, customizable and easy-to-use campaign performance reports. The new version of Mobucks also includes an advanced user management system that recognizes its users based on their roles and functions, and thus provides a plug-and-play connection to ad networks and any other ad sales partners, assigning permissions to them accordingly.

O2 Germany Selects Yahoo! for Mobile Search

Yahoo! and O2 Germany have launched an exclusive, multi-year mobile search partnership, with Yahoo! providing the search services on O2’s mobile portals, displacing Google as its search partner of choice. Additionally, as part of the deal, O2’s portals will include links to some of Yahoo!’s most popular mobile properties, including Yahoo!’s new mobile homepage, Yahoo! Mail, News, Weather and Finance. Yahoo! will also provide sponsored search advertising as part of the mobile search experience.
The announcement builds on the global agreement struck between the two companies in 2007, which provided a framework for making oneSearch, Yahoo!'s mobile search offering, the main search service on Telefonica's mobile portals in 15 countries in Europe and Latin America, potentially reaching more than 100 million consumers worldwide.