House and Senate Democrats have introduced a bill that could take a bite out of Big Tech’s online advertising marketplace by banning co-called surveillance advertising.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), one of the bill’s co-sponsors, made it clear that the bill was clearly aimed at hitting Big Tech in the wallet.

“The first place to start in holding companies accountable is to attack the business model so many of the big tech companies depend on,” Wyden said of the bill. “If you take away the incentive to hoover up users’ personal data, you make it much harder to target them both with objectionable content and take a sledgehammer to the incentive to design platforms in a way that can be harmful — especially for kids and teens. That’s exactly what this legislation does.”

The Banning Surveillance Advertising Act prohibits the use of personal data to target advertising or from targeting ads based on race, gender, religion or other "protected class" categories.

The bill only allows targeted advertising based on a consumer’s location, but does allow contextual advertising, which are ads based on the content the user is engaging with.

A key to any such prohibition is the definition of “personal information.” The bill’s definition includes “a unique identifier that may be used to identify an individual or a connected device; or other personal information that can be used to identify an individual or a connected device.”

Violations of the ban would be enforced by the Federal Trade Commission under its “false and deceptive acts” authority.

In addition to Wyden, the bill is co-sponsored by Reps. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) and Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.). “I'm proud to partner with Representative Schakowsky and Senators Wyden and Booker on legislation to ban this toxic business model that causes irreparable harm to consumers, businesses, and our democracy,” Eshoo said.

The House Energy & Commerce Committee has approved a comprehensive data privacy protection regime that would limit targeted online advertising and ban it for youth.

The vote on the legislation, which followed a lengthy markup in the committee Wednesday (July 20), was 53-2.

The bipartisan American Data Privacy and Protection Act (H.R. 8152) is a comprehensive national privacy regime that would require companies to collect only the data necessary to provide their products or services, bill advocate Common Cause has said, and would allow consumers to correct or delete their data. There are also prohibitions on discriminatory data practices, algorithms and ad delivery.

The bill would require consumers to get a clear and conspicuous opportunity to opt out of targeted advertising, And if a consumer is younger than 17 and an advertiser knows this, they cannot be targeted with advertising at all.

The bill also creates a Youth Privacy and Marketing Division within the Federal Trade Commission charged with protecting the privacy of children and minors and with looking out for marketing directed at kids. The division will have to report to Congress annually on how successful it has been in its mission and on any emerging concerns about protecting the privacy of children and minors.

House E&C chair Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) pointed out that there is strong support for the bill in the Senate as well, so he appeared confident that the bill would pass both chambers and make it to President Joe Biden’s desk. ▪️

“USTelecom commends the House Energy & Commerce Committee for taking an important step toward a national privacy framework," said SVP, government affairs, Brandon Heiner. "While there is more to be done, we look forward to continuing to work with Congress to ensure any privacy law provides all of America’s broadband customers the protection they deserve.”

The Interactive Advertising Bureau, which says it cannot support the bill, warned that the legislation will create a less friendly online environment not just for advertisers and small businesses but for the average online user whose speed and convenience of online experience depend on data.

"By some estimates, the proposed legislation is more punitive than EU regulations, which harm investments," said Lartease Tiffith, EVP of public policy for IAB. "In an effort to ‘rein in Big Tech,’ Congress is stumbling down the same path, despite the consequences to small businesses and a vital industry."▪️

A comprehensive data privacy bill that would, among many other things, allow web users to opt out of targeted advertising — and ban ads aimed at children entirely — is heading to a markup July 20 in the House Energy & Commerce Committee.

The bipartisan American Data Privacy and Protection Act (H.R. 8152) is a comprehensive national privacy regime that would require companies to collect only the data necessary to provide their products or services, bill proponent Common Cause said, and would allow consumers to correct or delete their data. There are also prohibitions on discriminatory data practices/algorithms/ad delivery.

Also: Twitter to Pay $150 Million to Settle Privacy Complaint

The bill would require that consumers get a clear and conspicuous opportunity to opt out of targeted advertising. If a consumer is under 17, and an advertiser knows that, they cannot be targeted with advertising at all. 

The bill also creates a Youth Privacy and Marketing Division within the Federal Trade Commission, charged with protecting the privacy of children and minors and tasked with looking out for marketing directed at them. The division must report to Congress annually on how successful it has been in its mission and on any emerging concerns about protecting the privacy of children and minors.

The measure has supporters on both sides of the aisle and in both houses of Congress. That’s saying something in these politically divided times, particularly on an issue as complicated as data privacy protections.

Also: Bill Would Break Up Big Tech Ad Giants

“We are glad to see that the American Data Privacy and Protection Act is going to a full committee markup, and that Republican and Democratic leadership on the House Energy & Commerce Committee has come together on a comprehensive privacy proposal to protect our data online," Common Cause media and democracy program director Yosef Getachew said.

Watchdog group Common Cause is particularly heartened by the inclusion of civil-rights protections, given that privacy and data abuses have hit minority communities particularly hard, the organization said. ▪️

The discussion draft of a bipartisan data privacy bill has been circulated that would allow web users to "turn off" targeted advertising and take other steps to secure data privacy and protection.

The draft bill, which was unveiled Friday, is billed as the first such effort that has gotten bipartisan and bicameral (House and Senate) buy-in and one which requires "regulatory parity across the internet ecosystem."

The draft was circulated by Reps. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.), the chair and ranking members, respectively, of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, as well as Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee.

Absent from the list of the draft's backers was Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, which was billed as from  "House and Senate leaders."

In a statement, Cantwell signaled she had more than a few issues with the bill. 

 “For American consumers to have meaningful privacy protection, we need a strong federal law that is not riddled with enforcement loopholes," she said. "Consumers deserve the ability to protect their rights on day one, not four years later [The bill provides a private right of action for violations, meaning users can sue, but only beginning four years after enactment of the act]. Americans also deserve a law that imposes a duty of loyalty on the companies that collect and monetize personal data so that the companies cannot abuse that data.”

The trio of draft backers did single out Consumer Protection Subcommittee Chair Jan Schakowsky (D-I..), ranking member Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.), and "numerous members of the Senate Commerce Committee" for their leadership on the draft.

Also: IAB Tech Lab Launches GPP Global Ad Privacy Permissions Standard

On the targeted advertising front, the bill would require that consumers be given a "clear and conspicuous means" of opting out of such ads "prior to any targeted advertising and at all times afterwards."

It would also prevent targeted advertising to anyone under 17 if a covered entity has "actual knowledge" that the individual is 16 or younger. Those entities are also prevented from transferring covered data from anyone 13-17 to third parties without express consent.

To make sure that the government is paying close attention to how young people are being marketed online, the bill would create a Youth Privacy and Marketing Division at the Federal Trade Commission that "shall be responsible for addressing privacy and marketing concerns with respect to children and minors." The division will have to submit annual reports to Congress and add on-staff experts in "youth
development, data protection, digital advertising, and data analytics."

Other highlights of the draft:

The bill prevents the collection or use of data in a way that discriminates against anyone based on "race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, or disability."

The bill requires data minimization on the front end, so no more data is collected than necessary for an allowable use.

The bill creates a generally opt-out data collection regime, except for certain sensitive data, for which users must give their permission first (opt in).

“We appreciate the bipartisan momentum in the U.S. Congress to advance U.S. privacy protections and look forward to reviewing the specifics of the draft bill released today,” said ITI: The Information Technology Industry Council President Jason Oxman following the draft's release. “For years, ITI has urged U.S. policymakers to enact a comprehensive federal privacy law that builds mutual trust, protects consumers, and supports continued innovation, and we will evaluate the bill with those objectives in mind.” ■

Ad-technology company Ampersand said it has added new tools to its And platform, making it easier for local advertisers to create targeted, data-driven campaigns via cable and streaming programming.

The new capabilities include Local Broadcast and Cable Insights, which gives clients the ability to monitor and optimize buys across all their television investments.

It has also added Audience Builder, which helps set audience targets. For example, an auto dealer planning a baseball-related promotion could target Ford brand loyalists and baseball fans or heavy sports watchers.

The third tool is RFP and Ordering Workflow, which gives clients an easy dashboard for planning, executing and updating campaigns.

Also: Ampersand Offers Buyers a Total TV Measurement Solution

Gerrit Niemeijer, chief technology officer at Ampersand, told Broadcasting+Cable that the company’s data capabilities help large and small advertisers utilize the persuasiveness and engagement of TV and the targeting of digital.

“For the longest time in television, there wasn’t that much data available,” Niemeijer said. “Now, there’s so much data available, and we want to make it easier for our clients to activate against that.“

Owned by cable companies Comcast, Charter Communications and Cox Communications, Ampersand draws viewer data from set-top boxes in 42 million homes and can mount campaigns that reach 80 million homes, including more than 70% of all addressable households.

Ampersand takes a “Total TV” approach. “I’m a big believer in the power of television. It’s all about the content,“ Niemijer said. ”Linear, CTV, OTT, it’s all television to me. And the impact of a good TV commercial, I believe, is much higher than the impact of a good display ad.” 

Working with cable operators also gives Ampersand an advantage over broadcast competitors in targeting campaigns. Geographically, Ampersand is able to run campaigns across multiple DMAs. It can also target advertising zones within a DMA. At the same time, while TV stations can only target viewers watching a single network, Ampersand’s cable operators insert commercials on dozens of channels, increasing their reach.

Niemeijer also trusts the viewing data that Ampersand gets from cable subscribers, who have a direct subscribing relationship with the operators. “We have a very authenticated relationship,” he said, and the more-reliable data leads to higher match rates for campaigns.

Niemeijer said Ampersand was originally set up to counter the growing fragmentation in the cable TV market. While cord-cutting is eating into cable subscriber numbers, because it can also target streamers, Ampersand can help advertisers reaggregate viewers.

“The whole point was to create one-stop shopping,“ he said. “We’ll take care of the complications.” ■

As expected, President Joe Biden used his State of the Union speech to back a congressional effort to regulate how online edge platforms interact with the youngest Web surfers, including by banning certain targeted advertising to children.

The President minced no words, suggesting that social media was putting the bottom line ahead of children's health. 

"Children were struggling before the pandemic," he told his audience, citing "bullying, violence, trauma, and the harms of social media. 

"As Frances Haugen, who is here with us tonight, has shown, we must hold social media platforms accountable for the national experiment they’re conducting on our children for profit," he continued, "thanking her for the courage she showed as she stood for applause. "It’s time to strengthen privacy protections, ban targeted advertising to children, and demand tech companies stop collecting personal data on our children." 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) chair of the Senate Consumer Protection subcommittee, big Big Tech critic and chief sponsor of the Kids Online Safety Act, praised the President's take on protecting children online.

“President Biden is issuing a powerful call to action on the youth mental health crisis exacerbated by social media, addressed directly by my Kids Online Safety Act," said Blumenthal. "I’m leading this measure with Senator [Marsha] Blackburn [R-Tenn.] so kids and parents are empowered with tools and safeguards to protect against toxic online content like self-harm, eating disorders, and bullying—and to hold Big Tech accountable. This comprehensive bill culminates bipartisan hearings, and decades of work for me personally. I look forward to pushing for its swift passage to safeguard children online, putting them in better control of their online lives.”

House Energy and Commerce Committee ranking member Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) agreed that social media needed regulating, but suggested the President was joining a fight Republicans were already leading. 

“Big Tech must be held accountable for their utter disregard for people’s privacy and data security and well-being—especially our children, who are consistently being manipulated and exploited for profit by these companies," Morris said following the speech. "Protecting kids online starts by establishing a national privacy and data security framework and enacting legislation that stops Big Tech’s harmful abuse of power. 

“Since day one of this Congress, E&C Republicans have been leading on solutions to do just that, and have urged President Biden to take these concerns seriously. I welcome President Biden joining our call and urge my Democratic committee colleagues to stop dragging their feet and prioritize comprehensive privacy legislation and addressing Big Tech’s harm on kids. If Congressional Democrats truly want to promote Big Tech transparency and accountability, protect our kids, and strengthen privacy protections for Americans, they should start by reviewing and engaging with Republican’s on our solutions.” 

The President's backing of social media regulation also drew praise from a number of children's privacy advocates. 

"We applaud President Biden for recognizing what the Big Tech CEOs willfully deny, that their products and platforms play an important role in defining the future of this country," said Nicole Gill, co-founder and executive director of Accountable Tech. "The White House’s support for reforms like strengthening children’s privacy, banning surveillance advertising for children and young people online, and demanding algorithmic transparency and research access demonstrates the time is now to rein in Big Tech and hold these companies accountable for their role in the decline of young people's mental health."

Also: Facebook Whistleblower Gets Seat in Biden SOTU Box

"Children and teens need to be protected from surveillance advertising that identifies, tracks, profiles, and discriminates against them continuously," said Katharina Kopp, policy director at Center for Digital Democracy. "Digital marketers employ stealthy 'Big Data' tactics to manipulate young people, while also gathering their information gleaned from mobile phones, gaming platforms, and social media. The Center for Digital Democracy supports calls for Congress to enact legislation that guards the privacy of youth, bans surveillance advertising, institutes online safety by design, stops online discrimination, and invests in research to serve the best interest of children and teens."

"President Biden is right to name and lay out a platform to address the dire national youth mental health crisis," said Bethany Robertson, co-director, ParentsTogether. "A significant and growing body of research shows 'almost constant' social media use significantly harms kids’ mental health in a number of ways, including increasing depression and anxiety, lowering self-esteem and body image, and triggering addictive behaviors – resulting in mental and emotional harm, and even death. This crisis is being driven by social media companies’ dangerous-by-design features, rooted in profit above kids’ safety. We urge social media companies and Congress to take quick, decisive action to protect kids..." ■

A bipartisan quartet of state attorneys general -- from Texas, Indiana and both Washingtons (the state and the District of Columbia) -- are suing Google over location data privacy and its use in targeted advertising.

The AGs argue that Google misled consumers by tracking their locations even when they believed they had disabled that feature, then using the data for targeted ads, to the "enormous" enrichment of the online platform.

"Google provides a setting called 'Location History' and tells users that, if they turn it off, 'the places you go are no longer stored," said the Texas AG's office. "In spite of this assurance, Google continues to track users’ location through other settings and methods that it fails to adequately disclose."

Also: Sen. Blumenthal Says Google, Bing Must Drop Suicide Site

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who has been on Google's case about alleged misuse of location data since at least 2017, including asking the Federal Trade Commission to investigate, signaled it was about time.

“The stunning allegations in this bipartisan suit by four attorneys general show, yet again, that tech companies continue to mislead, deceive, and prioritize profits over protecting user privacy," he said. "I’ve long raised alarm over Google’s location data deceptions and Big Tech’s lies must stop. Congress must urgently meet this moment in the privacy crisis by passing a comprehensive law that provides the privacy protections that Americans need and deserve.”

According to a copy of the Texas suit, the AG's are telling the courts that Google "has systematically misled, deceived, and withheld material facts from users in Texas about how their location is tracked and used and how to stop Google from monetizing their movements. More to the point, while many Texans may reasonably believe they have disabled the tracking of their location, the reality is that Google has
been hard at work behind the scenes logging their movements in a data store Google calls “Footprints.” But while footprints generally fade, Google ensures that the location information it stores about Texans is not so easily erased." ■

Another day, another stern letter from legislators to Facebook about their social media practices. 

This letter  — to founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg — came from Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Reps. Lori Trahan (D-Mass.) and Kathy Castor (D-Fla.), saying the company continues to engage in misleading targeted ad policies.

The legislators pointed out that in congressional testimony, Facebook global head of safety Antigone Davis said that young people could only be targeted on the site based on gender, age or location, but that new research showed that Facebook itself targets ads to people using a machine learning system tied to personal data, including browsing history.

The letter follows a complaint by a coalition of groups last week, led by Reset Australia and Fairplay, which said their analysis found that the company continued to collect teen data “to fuel its ad-delivery system.” While advertisers may not be able to target teens, they said, the company's algorithm's can.

Also: Haugen Hearing: Sen. Blumenthal Calls It Facebook’s Big Tobacco Moment

“Facebook’s announcement that it would limit ad targeting to users under the age of 18 implicitly acknowledged the harms that targeted advertisements pose to young people, and Facebook explicitly stated it was committed to taking a ‘more precautionary approach’ in its advertising practices when it announced its policy change,” the lawmakers said in their letter to Zuckerberg. “Unfortunately, new research suggests that harmful advertising practices on Facebook continue.”

“[I]t’s wrong to say that because we show data in our transparency tools it’s automatically used for ads,” Facebook spokesman Joe Osborne said of the coalition’s complaint. "We don’t use data from our advertisers' and partners' websites and apps to personalize ads to people under 18. The reason this information shows up in our transparency tools is because teens visit sites or apps that use our business tools. We want to provide transparency into the data we receive, even if it's not used for ads personalization."

Markey, Trahan and Castor asked for the answers to the following questions by Dec. 13:

1.) “Since Facebook’s announcement [last July] that it will limit ad targeting to users under 18, what specifically has Facebook done to restrict advertisers’ abilities to reach young users?

2.) “Determine in part what commercial content users under 18 on your platform see? If yes, please describe the program in detail.

a. “What types of user data does this system collect or employ?

b. “Does this system collect or employ data from users under the age of 13?

c. “How long has Facebook used this system?

3.) “Will Facebook commit to releasing its algorithmic process for ad targeting to be studied by independent researchers? If not, why not?

4.) “Please describe in detail the ways in which Facebook uses data about the interest and browsing history of users under 18.

5.) “Has Facebook conducted any internal research on the effects of targeted advertising on

users under 18? If so, please provide this research in its entirety.

6.) “Has Facebook communicated with potential advertisers about Facebook’s advertising ‘Delivery System’ and its ability to target users under 18? If so, please describe these communications in detail.

7.) “Has Facebook’s advertising ‘Delivery System’ ever served an advertisement to a user under 18 that promoted weight-loss, nicotine or alcohol use?

8.) “Will Facebook commit to ending targeted advertising to users under 18 on all of its platforms? If not, why not?”

Markey, Castor and Trahan teamed up last April to discourage Facebook from plans to create a kids’ version of its Instagram platform. Those Instagram Kids plans have been under a klieg light in D.C. and elsewhere after whistleblower Frances Haugen turned over internal research to Congress showing the company knew that some young people were hurt by the platform. Facebook countered that the same research found that most kids said they were helped by being on Instagram, adding that it could use both findings to help improve the site.

Vevo has introduced a new product that uses artificial intelligence to group music videos by mood, allowing advertisers to more effectively engage viewers.

Vevo’s Moods lets advertisers run ads in appropriate content, such as Valentine’s Day ads in heartfelt music videos. Other mood categories include fun, impassioned and empowering. More moods will be rolled out over the next few month.

Also Read: Vevo Music Videos Streaming Via Comcast’s X1 and Flex

Aligning the ad creative with the emotion of the music makes the ads more memorable, boosting ad recall and brand favorability, Vevo said.

“With Moods, we can not only curate Vevo programming to better match a person’s mood, but we can also directly ensure advertisers that their campaigns are more meaningful and impactful in the same way that we guarantee a high-quality, brand-safe environment,” said Kevin McGurn, president of sales and distribution at Vevo. “Therefore, it’s the logical step that we have synergy between the ad creative and the mood it evokes with the music video it surrounds.” 

Vevo worked with music data company Musixmatch to label videos based on the energy and tone of each song. Musixmatch assigned a mood to each Vevo video’s metadata tag, empowering the new capability.

“We’re thrilled to see Vevo enriching the advertising experiences embracing the next generation of metadata that our cutting-edge platform can deliver thanks to our Mood AI tech,” said Max Ciociola, founder and CEO of Musixmatch.

NCC Media, the TV ad sales and technology company owned by Comcast, Charter Communications and Cox Communications, has changed its name to Ampersand, adding that it plans to aggregate viewership data from its partners for targeted advertising and to build on its Open AP partnership.

The new name reflects the company's mission of unifying the TV advertising ecosystem across all screens, inventory and audiences, Ampersand said in a press release.

In addition, Ampersand said it has unified aggregated viewership data from nearly 40 million households in the Comcast, Charter and Cox footprints. The company added it is building on its Open AP partnership, allowing advertisers who work with Ampersand’s Client Partnerships team to directly share audience definitions created in OpenAP for expression and use in local advanced advertising.

As part of that expanded relationship, Ampersand said it will serve as part of the central hub for network-enabled addressable ads for Comcast, Charter and Cox. Working in partnership with Canoe, Ampersand will help TV programmers enable addressable capabilities on their national linear and VOD TV inventory.

"Thirty years ago, NCC showed the TV world the power of working together, unifying the fragmented cable TV ad market within a single, open platform for the benefit of advertisers, agencies and MVPDs," Ampersand CEO Nicolle Pangis said in a press release. "The Ampersand name and the new audience products represent both a nod to our past and our vision for a successful TV future in which the industry rallies around a shared approach for connecting brands to audiences across the entirety of the viewing experience."

Charter Communications said its ad sales business Spectrum Reach, has completed the rollout of AudienceApp, the data-driven TV planning tool developed in partnership with advanced data analytics company 605.

AudienceApp is now available in over 80 markets since first launching in Austin in August 2017. The state-of-the art tool allows marketers to execute more effective advertising campaigns by utilizing Spectrum’s proprietary household viewing data to better identify and target the right consumers.

AudienceApp uses anonymized and aggregated subscriber viewing data, combined with third-party consumer data, to target specific consumer attributes. To date, AudienceApp has led to the production of nearly four million ads that have run across top categories from automotive, healthcare, retail, legal, education, and real estate.

Related: Dolan Family Ventures Launches Data and Analytics Company 

“Part of our goal in launching AudienceApp was to differentiate ourselves in the market by bringing the ease and functionality of traditional digital platforms, paired with our proprietary household viewing data, to linear television,” said Charter EVP and Spectrum Reach president David Kline in a statement. “The tool has exceeded our expectations. Our clients are seeing the benefits of buying television using this targeted audience-based linear approach, and the response has been overwhelmingly positive.”

Spectrum Reach and 605 developed AudienceApp as part of a strategic data partnership announced last year. 

“605 and Charter are firmly committed to driving the adoption of audience-based advertising and improving targeting and measurement solutions,” said 605 co-founder and president Ben Tatta in a statement. “The AudienceApp, which is powered by 605’s proprietary data platform, is a great example of how data, analytics and technology can be leveraged to strengthen Spectrum Reach’s advertising business, and its ability to optimize clients’ TV ad investments. We are truly excited about our partnership with Charter and this important milestone in deploying the AudienceApp to salespeople in some of the largest DMAs in the US.”

Related: Charter Introduces Advanced Ad Products at NewFronts 

Spectrum Reach said it is planning on working with 605 to add more features and enhancements to AudienceApp for a more integrated user experience in the coming months, including Salesforce integration, the ability to create annual campaigns as well as support for the New York Interconnect, regional networks, and custom audience segments.

Oath, the Verizon unit that contains Yahoo and AOL, said it has applied greater focus on delivering addressable, targeted advertising to the Fios TV footprint.

That move follows a decision to shut down ONE TV, a programmatic TV offering that originated with AOL and tied in AOL’s 2013 acquisition of Adap.tv.

AOL Becomes ‘ONE’ With Programmatic Advertising

“The Fios household addressable offering represents what we believe to be the future of television,” Brett Hurwitz, business lead, advanced TV at Oath, said. “Today’s TV’s ecosystem is changing and the pace of that change is only going to accelerate.”

While digital programmatic advertising has added targeting and accountability, bringing that model will have a greater impact, he said.

RELATED: Oath Announces 10 New Video Series at NewFront

He said One TV was a “great product” for the clients that used it (they could essentially self-serve and buy against their targets online), but said it likewise made sense to shift more focus to Fios’s TV footprint of about 4.6 million homes as the future of TV moves from a model of one to many, to one-to-one.

The Fios TV addressable offering was launched in the fall of 2016 and initially ran in parallel with One TV (Oath has retained the intellectual property for One TV and could still use it for future endeavors). 

Hurwitz said the move also makes sense as advertisers use a portion of their linear TV budget to buy household addressable campaigns and use that data for their larger linear TV ad buying spend.

There’s a logical progression with household addressable approaches that allow marketers to use that same targeting data and measurement data for their OTT-connected campaigns and for the results of TV-based campaigns to complement and fuel their “lower funnel” digital activity.

Hurwitz also stressed that this isn’t about selling remnant inventory, but focused on premium properties offered on Fios TV that have been enabled for this level of sophisticated household addressability.

“The exciting thing for us is this change in television is really here,” he said. 

Dish Media Sales said Volvo Cars was the first partner to deliver a campaign via a new addressable, cross-platform system that enables advertisers to buy on Dish and Sling TV with a single buy.

Dish Media Sales said the campaign, executed through global media agency Mindshare NA (GroupM is its parent company) and the use of anonymized data, enabled Volvo to reach four segments of luxury car enthusiasts across both Dish’s satellite TV platform and Sling TV’s OTT-delivered service.

The nine-week campaign used four ad creatives that aimed to capture share in the luxury car category while also influencing consumers who were looking to upgrade to a fancier ride.

“As the definition of TV changes, we’re focused on smarter targeting that drives Volvo Cars’ message directly to our audience anywhere on any device,” Kevin Corcoran, marketing communications manager for Volvo Cars, said in a statement. “Uniting Dish and Sling TV’s unique audiences allows us to zero in on our 'in-market' customer regardless of network, device and even platform.”

Added Brian Norris, vice president of Dish Media Sales: "We’ve joined two distinct TV footprints and consolidated the buying, targeting and measurement process for advertisers looking to capture that premium TV viewer anytime, anywhere. Today, consumers watch live TV wherever they are, whether it’s from their living room couch or their morning commute.”

Charter Communications has made an undisclosed investment in advanced data and analytics firm 605 as part of a broader partnership that will help the MSO offer more impression-based, targeted advertising opportunities in all its markets.  

New York-based 605 launched late last year following the acquisition of Analytics Media Group (AMG) by Dolan Family Ventures, the newly formed investment fund run by former Cablevision Systems execs Kristin and James Dolan that provides census-based TV measurement.

RELATED: Dolan Family Ventures Launches Data and Analytics Company

Under the partnership, Charter will provide 605 with aggregated and anonymized set-top data from all of its U.S. cable systems. In turn, 605 will use its own proprietary data infrastructure and analytics systems to enhance advertising and campaign measurement solutions for Spectrum Reach, the ad sales division of Charter.

605 will be used to help power Spectrum Reach’s AudienceApp, a tool for linear media planning and optimization. Charter, which introduced AudienceApp in New York during a NewFront presentation in May, said Spectrum Reach plans to launch the product in Austin, Texas, on August 15, and complete the roll out across the MSO’s footprint by mid-2018.

RELATED: Charter Adds Advanced Ad Products at NewFronts

“Everybody is using data now, but not a lot of people can make sense of it,” David Kline, EVP at Charter and president of Spectrum Reach, said. “We felt that 605 and their management team would be terrific partners because they understand data. We think it could be a great venture between the two of us."

He said 605 has been helping Charter build AudienceApp, a media planning tool that optimizes linear television buys. By way of example, Kline explained that the app could help a car dealership target specific territories and audiences and get more bang from their buck by employing an optimized schedule of available TV ad inventory.

The data used is aggregate and does not use any personally identifiable information (PII), but it can highly optimize the ad schedule to reach the homes desired, he said.

“We’re really going to use it as the backbone of all our local sales opportunities across 41 states, 100 DMAs and about 1,500 commissioned sales people,” said Kline, an industry vet who joined Charter in 2015 and is also late of Visible World (now part of Comcast), Ensequence, and was previously president and COO of  Cablevision Media Sales (Cablevision Systems is now part of Altice USA).”This is a whole new way for us to sell.”

Kristin Dolan, CEO and founder of 605, said the Charter agreement represents a unique partnership opportunity for her company. At the same time, 605, she added, licenses data from other third parties and is moving ahead on goal to do what it’s doing for Charter on a national basis for programmers and brands in a PII-compliant way.

She said it also speaks to a broader trend in which data, targeting and impression-based campaigns become a critical part of the TV advertising world.

"I think it really is the culmination of a desire for people to continue to utilize television, but wanting this specialized targeting that they experience with digital," she said. "We're obviously strong believers in TV. We're big believers in an optimized media mix, but TV has to be a part of most advertisers' initiatives...but not just targeted advertising to drive impulse-buying and specific buying, but also for brand development and for brand loyalty."

605 also announced that Kline and James Blackley, EVP, engineering and information technology at Charter, are part of an initial board that also includes Kristin Dolan, who is also managing partner of Dolan Family Ventures, and James Dolan, now executive chairman of The Madison Square Garden Company.

Investment banking firm PJT Partners is providing consulting services to Dolan Family Ventures and provided advisory support for the Charter partnership.

Two competitors, Sky and Virgin Media, have struck a strategic partnership to deliver data-driven, targeted TV advertising across the platforms of both service providers.

The partnership, which clearly shoots for scale around targeted TV ads, will involve a potential audience of about 30 million TV viewers in the U.K. and Irelands, they said, holding that those numbers put them on par with leading social networks.”

The agreement covers both targeted linear and VOD advertising, and will involve technology developed by Liberty Global, Virgin Media’s parent company, as well as Sky’s AdSmart platform. They will develop a “one-stop buying point” via Sky Media for targeted ads, with impressions served across Virgin Media’s and Sky’s addressable set-top boxes.

Sky noted that there are currently more than 100 AdSmart-enabled channels, including its own channels as well as A+E Networks (History, Lifetime, Crime + Investigation) and Viacom (MTV, Comedy Central, Channel 5). NBC Universal, including its Universal Channel, is set to join that list.

In Ireland, Sky AdSmart is currently in the test phase and will enter the roll-out phase in the “coming months.”

Virgin Media’s Pat Kiely, managing director of TV3 in Irelands, and Jamie West, group director of advanced advertising at Sky Media, will head up development of the strategic partnership, the companies said.

“Quality programming deserves to be supported with quality advertising. In partnering with Sky we’re putting the UK and Ireland at the forefront of TV advertising innovation,” Virgin Media chief exec Tom Mockridge, said in a statement. “We’re giving consumers advertising that is more relevant to them and giving brands a trusted destination to deliver intelligent, tailored TV campaigns to a targeted audience.

Addressable TV is the high quality, brand safe and transparent medium that leading brands have already been adopting in their thousands,” added Sky Group’s COO Andrew Griffith. “Today’s partnership takes that to the next level with the extension of AdSmart to millions more homes meaning more relevant ads for Virgin customers and a larger platform for advertisers.”

Swirl Networks and AccuWeather have teamed on an indoor mobile location marketing initiative that relies on real-time weather data.

They said retail marketers that use Swirl’s platform can now tap into AccuWeather's data sets, which includes weather conditions and forecasts for more than 2 million locations worldwide, to help tailor and trigger in-store mobile experiences based on the shopper’s local weather conditions.

The integration, they said, enables Swirl’s mobile platform to offer targeting based on both weather and indoor location. Swirl’s mobile presence marketing platform uses a range of indoor location signals, including Bluetooth beacons, WiFi, and Visible Light Communications (VLC) to deliver targeted content to a shopper’s smartphone based on their precise in-store location.

The new deal with AccuWeather, they said, will help retailers and brands create in-store mobile messages, content and services they deliver based on a variety of local weather data, including weather forecast conditions, temperature, wind, precipitation, UV index, and pollen count.

By way of example, they said a pharmacy chain could alert in-store shoppers that pollen and allergen counts are forecasted to rise and put up special offers on allergy relief products that are available in the medicine aisle. 

Oracle has been signed on to help Charter Communications deliver addressable ads to its base of about 16.5 million TV subs, AdWeek reported from this week’s Oracle Data Summit in New York.

The deal marks the entry into the targeted TV ad sector for Oracle Data Cloud, the unit that supplies data and analytics to marketers and publishers.

Spectrum Reach is the Charter unit focused on advanced advertising for digital, set-top VOD and addressable/data products.

“We are trying to get to a place where we take standardized segmentation that we’ve pre-created and build it into [Charter’s] system,” Joe Kyriakoza, head of autos and TV solutions for Oracle Data Cloud, told AdWeek.  “We can help them understand segments of frequent buyers of toothpaste, frequent buyers of certain kinds of vehicles, frequent buyers of kinds of clothing lines.”

Oracle this week inked a deal to acquire Moat, a digital measurement company that counts clients such as ESPN, Facebook, NBCUniversal, Snapchat and YouTube.

RELATED: Oracle Buys Digital Measurement Specialist Moat

iSpot.tv has introduced an enhanced ad-tracking system that uses data culled from millions of smart TVs to determine the effectiveness of TV ads akin to the way the performance of digital advertising can be monitored and measured.

Tracking how much attention consumers give to those ads all the way to a “conversion” – an action such as visiting a web site or registering or making a purchase – “is a journey that the TV networks are going through,” Sean Muller, iSpot.tv’s CEO, explained.

That same system, he added, also tells advertisers the optimal number of times a TV ad must be seen before a conversion takes place, and gives a good sense of which ads are the most effective, as well as how they are performing on specific channels and networks, specific shows and genres, and at different parts of the day.

Clients, he said, can remove some of the guess-work from the equation by using this data when they launch their campaigns, determine what's working, adjust, “and then step on the gas.”

Using this data to determine the conversion rate and overall effectiveness of TV advertising, “fills a major void in the marketplace” and represents a “leap beyond…audience targeting,” Muller said, noting that nearly 30 brands are already adopting iSpot.tv’s new offering, including two large wireless carriers, major automakers, and a mix of banks, financial services firms and insurance carriers. He hopes to expand that number to 60 to 80 by year-end.

For the ad-impression data gathering, iSpot.tv has a partnership/integration agreement with TV giant Vizio. Muller said that relationship started about three years ago with his company’s ad catalog.

 “We are assessing and talking to others,” he said. “It’s a very complex integration.”

Experian, the credit monitoring service, is one client that iSpot.tv is allowed to identify.

In a campaign in January, it found 123,175 “conversion events” from 15.52 million impressions from the smart TV population tracked by iSpot.tv’s system, giving the company a conversion rate of 0.790%. Experian used that data to test out different creative and was able to hone in on two 30-second spots that were the most effective.

TiVo has hired Walt Horstman as senior vice president and general manager, analytics and advertising, where he’ll lead a team tasked with improving ad targeting and effectiveness across devices and platforms.

Horstman joins TiVo from AudienceXpress, the programmatic TV ad subsidiary of Visible World, the ad-tech company acquired last year by Comcast.  Horstman, who previously served as SVP of media solutions at Visible World, is also late of Cablevision Systems (now part of Altice USA) and Accenture.

RELATED: Visible World Joins Comcast's Ad Orbit

Horstman will be based out of the TiVo’s New York office and report to Pete Thompson, the company’s executive vice president and chief operating officer.

RELATED: Rovi Seals Deal for TiVo

“As an accomplished executive with a proven track record of leading cross-functional teams, Walt brings renewed perspective and deeply relevant experience to TiVo’s analytics and advertising offerings,” Thompson said, in a statement. “His diverse background and industry knowledge surrounding data-driven insights and advanced TV advertising make him especially well-suited for this role and we’re thrilled to have him on-board to further our analytics strategy.”

Horstman holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and German literature from Amherst College and a masters of business administration, marketing and technology management from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. He also spent time studying German language and literature at Freie Universitat in Berlin.

Adding another layer of consolidation to the ad-tech industry, AT&T, Dish Network and WPP said they struck a deal to acquire addressable/targeted ad specialist Invidi Technologies.

Financi terms were not announced, but Invidi will continue to operate independently under the collective ownership of the three companies, and AT&T, Dish and WPP will name reps to the Invidi board of directors. AT&T will hold a controlling interest in the venture.

Invidi will maintain its employees in their current locations, which include Princeton, N.J., Newtown, Pa., New York, Denver, Colo. and Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

Invidi, founded in 2000, makes addressable video advertising software and platforms that enable targeting based on demographic and psychographic attributes and can be further customized for advertisers.

Invidi, which has raised more than $132 million, according to CrunchBase, announced last year it had secured a patent for the national insertion of targeted advertising.

AT&T, Dish and WPP are teaming on the acquisition of Invidi after Comcast bulked up its advanced advertising portfolio through a string of purchases that included Visible World, a programmatic and targeted ad-tech company, This Technology, and Freewheel, which acquired StickyADS.tv earlier this year. 

AT&T, Dish and WPP said they’ll work together and with existing INVIDI clients to expand the ad-tech vendor’s addressable capabilities and product offerings to other video delivery platforms.

RELATED: Cox Media to Test Targeted Advertising

The deal is also coming together in the wake of the AT&T-DirecTV merger and the subsequent absorption of DirecTV’s ad business.  Dish Media Sales, meanwhile, introduced addressable advertising in 2012, and now serves targeted ads to more than 100 networks and north of 8 million homes via Dish Network and Sling TV.

“Invidi gives us a great opportunity to expand our addressable advertising capabilities,” Rick Welday, president of  AT&T AdWorks, said  in a statement. We have significantly increased revenue with targeted advertising across multiple platforms. This deal will help us accelerate growth in our addressable advertising business and explore innovation and expansion into new platforms.”

“We were the first strategic investor back in 2007 and are retaining our position so that we can influence the addressable ecosystem for the benefit of our clients,” added Irwin Gotlieb, chairman, GroupM Global, WPP’s wholly owned media investment management company.

Tim Hanlon, founder and CEO of The Vertere Group, tweeted that the deal is good news for the advanced ad tech ecosystem:

HUGE step towards standardizing TV ad addressability RT AT&T, DISH and WPP to Acquire INVIDI, Operate it Together https://t.co/MBcTfuHOmH

— Timhanlon (@Timhanlon) November 21, 2016

Dolan Family Ventures, the newly formed investment fund run by former Cablevision Systems executives Kristin and James Dolan, has pulled the trigger on its first acquisition and has launched its first company.

RELATED: Kristin and James Dolan Form Tech Investment Fund

That new company, called 605, emerges following the acquisition of Analytics Media Group (AMG), a New York-based data analytics specialist.

605, also based in New York, said it will combine AMG’s analytics and technology platform and set-top box data to provide clients with the kind of information that can help them develop targeted, optimized ad and media campaigns.

The aim of 605, said company founder and CEO Kristin Dolan, centers on “the opportunity to make TV more impactful – having the right data and the right analysis to drive more effective advertising.”

Among the execs joining Kristin Dolan at 605 are company president Ben Tatta, most recently president of Cablevision Media Sales, and EVP of client solutions Chauncey McLean, AMG’s co-founder and chief revenue officer. 605 has just under 50 employees. 

Update:Per the 605 website, other members of the leadership team include other execs who are late of Cablevision -- Ray Casazza (SVP of finance and administration), Colleen Moraghan (SVP of data solutions), and Charlstie Veith (SVP of marketing and communications).

And the significance of the number? 605, we’re told, is code for “DCV,” or Data Co. Ventures, the original project name of Dolan Family Ventures. DCV is also the Roman numeral equivalent of 605.

AMG rose to fame in 2008 for using analytics and set-top data for the 2008 Obama campaign (and worked with the campaign again in 2012), and Walmart is one of its key clients today. AMG had also done some work for Cablevision Systems, which wrapped up its sale to Altice in June.

“It’s a great acquisition for us,” Dolan said, noting that she has had her eyes on AMG for a couple of years. “It’s a combination of really strong, smart young talent, and they have some IP [intellectual property] that we find really interesting, and they have some strong client relationships.”

Moving forward, 605 will focus on clients spanning MVPDs, programmers and ad agencies.

While MVPDs have their own inventory, they are also big consumers of paid media, Dolan said. Major TV networks, meanwhile, are focused on using data and analytics to create customer segmentation and targeting. That same data, she added, can also be valuable to smaller programmers that are trying to get a better fix on the makeup of their viewership. 605 will also work with individual advertisers as well as agencies to optimize their media buys.

"We're very neutral because we're never going to sell media,” said Dolan, who most recently was COO of Cablevision. “The data tells what the data tells, and we can help [our clients] craft custom media plans." 

Though others use set-top data and analytics to help with ad targeting and media plan optimization, 605 will look to stand apart by leaning on census-level, authenticated data a platform from AMG that covers 120 million homes underpinned by segmentation profiles built around more than 1,500 different attributes.

RELATED: AT&T AdWorks Offers 60-Second Addressable Format for Linear TV

“With addressable [advertising] becoming more and more prevalent, there’s an opportunity for people to take the insight and do on television what they’ve been able to do on digital for a long time,” Dolan said.

AT&T confirmed that it is sunsetting Internet Preferences, a targeted Web advertising program it has been using in tandem with its lower-cost GigaPower broadband service tiers. 

In Austin, for example, AT&T has been selling a Premiere tier of the 1-Gig service for $70 per month, when subscribers agreed to participate in Internet Preferences alongside a Standard version, without the targeted ad option, for $99 per month.

AT&T said that, starting in October, all GigaPower customers, regardless of whether or not they previously chose to opt-in, will receive the stand-alone 1-Gig service for $70 – a price that happens to match up with Google Fiber’s stand-alone gigabit offering.

“To simplify our offering for our customers, we plan to end the optional Internet Preferences advertising program related to our fastest internet speed tiers,” AT&T said in a statement. “As a result, all customers on these tiers will receive the best rate we have available for their speed tier in their area."

AT&T noted that it began to communicate this update to customers this week. 

AT&T AdWorks, the company’s advanced advertising division, said it has launched the option to serve 60-second ads to its base of about 14 million addressable TV homes, which includes a subset of DirecTV subscribers.

AT&T said it’s adding this new option because advertisers often require more than a 30-second ad to deliver their message on TV.  

AT&T AdWorks now offers 60-, 30- and 15-second linear addressable ad capabilities.

“A 60-second linear addressable ad is a game-changing addition to our platform,” said Rick Welday, president, AT&T AdWorks. “Advertisers, across all different industries, are looking for additional time to engage their target audience, while taking advantage of innovative addressable TV solutions that minimize waste. We’re excited to address this need.”

AT&T AdWorks hosted its first “Addressable Upfronts” earlier this year, and recently launched trade ads touting its addressable ad platform.

Viacom said it formed a partnership with Roku to deliver targeted advertising to over-the-top viewers.

Viacom will be able to used data from Roku to address messages to custom audience segments viewing on Roku devices. Roku users streamed 5.5 billion hours of content in 2015.

Viacom has complained that tradition ratings don't include viewers watching its content on digital devices. The agreement helps monetize some of that viewing.

Viacom bought a stake in Roku earlier this year.

Read more at B&C. 

Highlighting the growing importance and availability of targeted advertising,  AT&T AdWorks said it will host what it’s billing as the first “Addressable Upfronts” starting in April.

AT&T AdWorks said the plan is to host more than 100 customized Upfronts nationwide to help clients get a better fix on the company’s addressable targeted advertising capabilities. Of that mix, its New York City event will be held at the AT&T AdWorks Lab.

The ad division noted that the events will highlight its linear Addressable TV offering and its new cross-screen addressable capabilities. Last week, the company noted that it already offers a linear TV addressable advertising solution in its live and playback modes in approximately 13 million households nationwide.

“Our addressable advertising offer maximizes the return on ad spending by matching the right ad with the right household and audience. It’s a more meaningful way of doing advertising. We wanted to apply that same strategy to our upfront events,” Jason Brown, vice president of national advertising sales, AT&T AdWorks, said in a statement. “Our Addressable Upfronts will maximize the time agencies and advertisers invest with us throughout a busy upfront season.”

Cadent Technology, a new ad-tech unit that merged the teams of BlackArrow and Cadent Network, said it has developed a new network-based addressable ad platform for linear TV for its partners in the pay-TV industry.

To demonstrate that capability, the company recently showed its campaign platform splicing in 30-second ads, based partly subscriber demographic data, on set-tops from Pace (now part of Arris) equipped with the Reference Design Kit, a preintegrated software stack managed by Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Liberty Global.

In the demo, the system delivered an ad for potential car buyers, and another that would be associated with a set-top for a subscriber that is not part of that specific group.

Rather than having the ad-decisioning occur in the set-top, Cadent’s system implements that in the network, whereby the box detects the in-band signal that calls back to the network to receive the proper ad that’s driven by the campaign manager.

That system, explained Les Carter, vice president and chief architect at Cadent Technology, in a recent briefing, can deliver real-time ad insertion and ad-decisioning based on linear multicast feeds. The solution can still use use QAM-based multicast content feeds, but can also use an IP-backed backhaul (via a box’s integrated DOCSIS modem, for example) to make the ad-decisions back in the network and use IP technology to acquire the ad assets.

Cadent also claims that its new unified ad control plane now supports a range of delivery methods, including QAM, IP, IP adaptive bit rate, and mobile, while also supporting live TV, as well as time-shifted video.

Carter also noted that the system is now equipped to be agnostic, as it can work with the company’s own ad servers, or ad servers from companies such as FreeWheel (now part of Comcast) or Google’s DoubleClick, for example.

That product, he said, is the first to emerge from the recently combined teams, whereby BlackArrow is best known for dynamic ad insertion, while Cadent’s expertise has focused on linear advertising.

Carter said Cadent Technology is in the process of setting up lab trials with partners.

BlackArrow, now part of the unit, has DAI partners that include TWC, Comcast, Charter Communications, Bright House Networks, Rogers Communications and Liberty Global/Virgin Media. BlackArrow has also been a partner of Canoe Ventures, the MSO-backed advanced ad J.V. backed by Comcast, TWC, Cox Communications, and Bright House Networks.

Of that group, Time Warner Cable Media, the ad sales arm of Time Warner Cable, announced recently that its Ads Everywhere platform now offers addressable campaigns for linear TV and VOD that can be targeted to the household level.

Cross MediaWorks (Cadent’s  holding company) announced the acquisition of BlackArrow in August 2015.

Time Warner Cable Media, the ad sales arm of Time Warner Cable, said its Ads Everywhere platform now offers addressable campaigns for linear TV and VOD that can be targeted to the household level.

That capability, supported across the MSO’s 10.8 million digital video households, also give marketers the ability to dynamically insert targeted ads on its authenticated TWC TV app,  which supports several platforms, including iOS and Android mobile devices, Roku players, Samsung smart TVs, and Xbox One and Xbox 360 consoles.

Update: For those keeping score, AT&T AdWorks noted in a statement that it already offers a linear TV addressable advertising solution in its live and playback modes in approximately 13 million households nationwide.

TWCM Ads Everywhere, a service introduced in 2014, lets marketers target consumers with specialized ads using demographic data such as household income, lifestyle, and purchasing preferences, the company said.

Notably, TWCM recently completed the rollout of KernelConnect, a campaign performance measurement tool that integrates anonymous aggregated linear TV data as well as digital advertising and third party data.

“We continue to develop better ad solutions for marketers as they strive to connect with consumers who have more control over their viewing experiences,” said Joan Gillman, Time Warner Cable’s EVP and COO, Media Services. “What sets TWCM apart is the greater ability for marketers to accurately target specific segments of audiences at the household level during live programming on TWC TV and VOD. As consumer usage of the TWC TV app and VOD offerings continue to grow and become more personalized, our addressable advances allow advertisers to capitalize across every screen in cable during television programming.”

TWC is in the process of being acquired by Charter Communications, which has developed a next-gen advanced ad platform called Spectrum Reach, and recently hired former Comcast exec Rob Klippel to SVP, advanced advertising products and strategy.

Visible World, the Comcast-owned maker of targeted and programmatic advertising technology company, has appointed industry vet David Kline to the post of president and chief operating officer.

Kline joins Visible World more than a month after Comcast acquired the company, which counts Bright House Networks, Cablevision Systems, Cox Communications, Charter Communications, Suddenlink and Time Warner Cable among its clients.

Kline most recently was COO at Ensequence, which introduced a distributor-agnostic interactive advertising platform for MVPDs, programmers and smart TV manufacturers in 2013. Prior to that, Kline was a long-time exec of Cablevision Media Sales, where he oversaw operations for Cablevision's advertising businesses, including local cable, interconnects, regional news channels, national cable networks, newspapers and introduced industry leading advanced advertising products and services.

Before going full-time with Visible World, Kline had been serving as a director of the company and consulted on several initiatives supporting MVPDs and their programmatic inventory sales, the company said. New York-based Visible World offers a programmatic TV platform via its AudienceXpress subsidiary.

"We are delighted that David has officially joined our team," Visible World CEO Seth Haberman said, in a statement. "Because of our shared forward-looking take on the space and his leadership, he has been a critical advisor to Visible World for some time. He joins us now, as we take the company to new heights in increasing the performance of TV ad inventory. Visible World has been a frontrunner in our industry -- and now we are taking the next step in our suite of products."

Comcast’s acquisition for Visible World came about a year after the operator  acquired online advertising specialist FreeWheel.

Bringing more advanced advertising capabilities in-house, Comcast has struck a deal to acquire Visible World, the New York-based maker of targeted ad systems and a programmatic TV platform via its AudienceXpress subsidiary.

The announcement, made Thursday in this blog post by Visible World CEO Seth Haberman, comes more than three months after The Wall Street Journalreported that Comcast and the vendor were in M&A talks.

Visible World’s partners include Comcast, Bright House Networks, Cablevision Systems, Cox Communications, Charter Communications, Suddenlink and Time Warner Cable, among others. Cox Media and Suddenlink are among the known customers of AudienceXpress.

Comcast’s proposed acquisition for Visible World also comes about a year after Comcast  acquired online advertising specialist FreeWheel.

Financial terms of the Comcast-Visible World deal were not announced, but the MSO plans for Visible World to operate as an independent business.

Haberman said the deal will help to take the ad tech firm to the “next level.”

“As the industry continues to evolve and expand, we’ve also looked for new opportunities to change, expand, strengthen and position our business for future success,” Haberman wrote. “So today, I am thrilled to announce that we have found the perfect partner to help us achieve our goals and help us take our business and services to the next level: Visible World has signed an agreement to be acquired by Comcast.”

“Visible World is a dynamic company and a real complement to our existing advanced advertising initiatives,” added John Schanz, executive vice president and chief network officer for Comcast Cable. “Visible World offers a diverse spectrum of services that serve a variety of needs across the television advertising landscape. This partnership reflects the business and technology trends we are seeing in the television industry today. We look forward to helping the talented Visible World team expand and accelerate their business and create more value for distributors, advertisers, agencies, programmers and affiliates.”

Founded in 2000, Visible World has raised about $33 million, including a $25 million "C" round, according to CrunchBase. 

In 2001, at the height of the dot com bubble, AOL acquired Time Warner for $164 billion. The giant of content and distribution was diluted (and deluded) by the king of narrowband, just as the broadband Internet was taking hold. We all know how that story ended.

Now, fifteen years later, Verizon intends to purchase AOL for $4.4 billion in cash. On the surface, this deal may seem expensive, if not retro. But viewed through the lens of today’s media landscape, it is strategic, and perhaps even prescient.

We’re at a crossroads: the insurgents are battling the incumbents for control over video’s future. The insurgents—Netflix, Google (with YouTube), Facebook (with Instagram), and Twitter (with Vine and Periscope)—are soaring on the expansive wings of the Internet. Verizon, a classic incumbent, is the nation’s largest wireless carrier. It is also the fourth largest wireline broadband ISP and the sixth largest multi-channel video provider (FiOS).

Yet the three-way intersection of video, wireless, and the Internet is a cornerstone of the future. Of course, subscription revenue will remain important. But the targeted ad business is white-hot, and the mobile Internet is its primary fountainhead of growth. With 108 million wireless subscribers, Verizon is not going to stand by idly while the insurgents feed off its fertile infrastructure.

Long before its 2009 spin-off from Time Warner, AOL was written off by just about everyone. But AOL has reincarnated itself into a credible player in today’s head-spinning environment. Most importantly, it assembled a comprehensive and unified ad-tech suite, including the programmatic and personalized techniques that automatically and efficiently match brands with eyeballs.

Secondarily, AOL owns some popular content such as the Huffington Post, TechCrunch, and Engadget. There’s also AOL On, a video aggregation site with numerous “channels” of original and licensed content.

While AOL’s ad technology is the golden goose, Verizon’s appetite for content ownership remains to be seen. On the heels of the aborted Comcast/Time Warner Cable deal, and the pending AT&T purchase of DirecTV, Verizon may test the regulatory waters by agreeing to sell off certain AOL content assets.

This is not Verizon’s first trip to the wireless video rodeo.

From 2007–2011, it offered V-Cast, using Qualcomm’s MediaFLO technology and dedicated UHF infrastructure. This mobile TV service comprised more than a dozen digital channels broadcast to 3G phones for $10 per month. The wireless giant learned some important lessons from V-Cast’s demise, namely the intrinsic value of the broadband Internet and the importance to consumers of on-demand video.

Last year, Verizon acquired Intel’s OnCue technology, a highly touted user interface with advanced search and navigation. Verizon Wireless has been lining up content with partners such as Viacom and Dreamworks Animation’s AwesomenessTV, a YouTube darling. It has also signed several college sports deals, and paid $1 billion to the NFL for the rights to stream live games to smartphones through the 2017 season.

We will soon see what Verizon has been brewing. Look for a mobile, over-the-top Internet video concoction, fusing live and on-demand content, with subscriptions alongside an advanced ad-tech infrastructure.

Perhaps this incumbent is really an insurgent in disguise.

About the author: Marc Tayer, author of the recently released book Televisionaries: Inside The Chaos and Innovation of The Digital Revolution, is a 30-year veteran of the media and communications technology business. Tayer led the team at General Instrument that developed the first digital TV system and submitted the first digital HDTV system to the FCC in 1990, and, during his career, has served in leadership roles at Motorola, Voom (Cablevision’s pioneering HDTV service), Aerocast, and Imagine Communications, among others.  

Google Fiber is getting ready to support Web-style, targeted, local advertising in its Kansas City-area footprint determined in part by viewing history “in the next few weeks,” the company announced Friday in this posting about the project.

The “small trial” will enable ads to be “digitally delivered in real time and can be matched based on geography, the type of program being shown (eg, sports or news), or viewing history,” Google Fiber explained. Customers, it added, can opt out of seeing ads based on viewing history by changing their Fiber TV settings.

Google said the local, targeted ads will appear during typical ad breaks, along with national ads, on linear TV and, in an interesting twist, will be inserted into DVR-recorded programs.

"Like digital ads, advertisers will only pay for ads that have been shown, and can limit the number of times an ad is shown to a given TV,” Google Fiber added. “We're excited to see how this test progresses, and we're looking forward to hearing from local businesses and viewers along the way."

However, "[t]he tracking at this point is pretty unsophisticated," an unnamed source told AdWeek about the initiative.

According to numbers uncovered by MoffetNathanson, Google Fiber ended 2014 with about 27,000 TV subs in Kansas City, Kan., and Kansas City, Mo.

Google Fiber’s local ad sales effort will compete with local ad avails that are sold by area pay-TV incumbents such as Time Warner Cable and AT&T U-verse. 

Comcast is in talks to acquire Visible World, a maker of targeted advertising systems and a player in the white-hot programmatic TV sector, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday, citing unnamed sources. 

Comcast and Visible World were not immediately available for comment, but the paper noted that a deal isn’t imminent and the discussions could instead lead to a deeper relationship between the two companies. 

While an acquisition of Visible World would give Comcast direct access to key targeted/addressable advertising technologies aimed primarily at set-top boxes, the company’s AudienceXpress subsidiary is focused on programmatic TV systems that bring digital-like automation to the advertising sales process.

Visible World’s partners include Comcast, Bright House Networks, Cablevision Systems, Cox Communications, Charter Communications, Suddenlink and Time Warner Cable, among others. Cox Media and Suddenlink are among the known customers of its AudienceXpress subsidiary. 

Comcast Ventures is also one of the investors in privately held Visible World.

Comcast has already signaled its interest in owning Web-style advertising companies and technologies. Last year, the MSO acquired online advertising specialist FreeWheel, which just issued a report showing that TV Everywhere advertising jumped significantly in the fourth quarter of 2014. 

Developing…