MediaCrossing, the latest entrant into the increasingly expansive programmatic ad-buying space, just raised $6 million in Series A equity financing. Led by Bill Lederer, former CEO of e-commerce startup, Art.com, and before that an executive at WPP’s Kantar, MediaCrossing doesn’t consider itself to be an ad exchange, a demand-side platform (DSP), or an ad network. Rather, the Stamford, based start-up purports to be a new type of trading partner for advertisers, agencies, and publishers.
In Wall Street terms, Lederer likens MediaCrossing’s role in the new advertising ecosystem to that of a “market maker” — which, along with connecting buyers and sellers, will be in a position to buy ad inventory on their behalf — and thus assume a share of the risk.
More broadly, “MediaCrossing represents the next generation of media trading … where Madison Avenue client focus, media savvy and marketing science meets Wall Street innovation and trading best practices,” Lederer told Online Media Daily.
Now, programmatic ad buying and selling is big business. The real-time bidding marketplace — one subset of programmatic (though the terms are often used interchangeably) — will exceed $3.3 billion, this year, eMarketer predicts.
For the full story click Mediapost