Company Announces $18 Million Growth Financing and Reaches Profitability Ahead of Plan
LOS ANGELES – the Rubicon Project, the advertising technology company, has acquired Fox Audience Network (FAN), one of the Web’s most advanced advertising technology platforms, to significantly expand its team and continue driving rapid revenue growth. The acquisition accelerates the Rubicon Project’s plan to deliver premium Web publishers the most complete, end-to-end display advertising platform. As part of the deal, News Corporation will receive a non-controlling minority equity stake in the new combined entity.
Separately, the Rubicon Project also announced an $18 million round of funding, bringing total financial investments to $60 million. The current financing round included funding from News Corporation, Clearstone Venture Partners, IDG Ventures Asia, Mayfield Fund, NBC Universal’s Peacock Equity Fund and Jarl Mohn. the Rubicon Project reached profitability in October 2010, ahead of plan and excluding any revenue from the FAN acquisition, it will generate more than $100 million in revenue in 2010.
“There is great synergy across the technology and market vision of the two companies and teams. Backed by News Corporation’s support, FAN’s talented engineering team has developed unique, industry-leading display advertising technologies,” said Frank Addante, CEO and Founder of the Rubicon Project. “the Rubicon Project’s REVV platform is the number one yield optimization platform in the industry, powering more than 60 billion ad transactions each month and will process 500 billion real-time bidding (RTB) transactions in Q4. REVV fuels the industry’s largest display advertising marketplace, where 600+ ad networks, exchanges and DSPs from around the world reach 550+ million unique users. The addition of FAN’s technology assets positions us to provide a complete platform 18-24 months ahead of schedule. Combining the technology with our market share and financial strength – we now have everything we need to successfully execute our vision.”
As part of the acquisition, more than 100 FAN employees will be joining the Rubicon Project team – a majority in engineering and product. the Rubicon Project does not sell its technology to advertisers; therefore it did not acquire FAN’s direct ad sales team.
Key assets and highlights of the FAN transaction include:
MyAds self-service ad buying platform
FAN’s SDC publisher ad server
Audience hypertargeting and insights technology
Real-time bidding algorithms
100+ FAN technology employees
Former CTO and EVP of Product, Technology and Operations at FAN, John Carnahan, joins the Rubicon Project’s leadership team as CTO. Carnahan will be responsible for overseeing all product development activities, and formulating long-term vision and strategy for the REVV platform. Prior to FAN, Carnahan was Lead Developer at Yahoo! Research.
About the Rubicon Project the Rubicon Project, the world leader in Yield Optimization technology, launched in 2007 with a mission to automate buying and selling across the $65 billion global online advertising industry. Powered by data-driven algorithms and pricing intelligence data, REVV, the company’s yield optimization platform, has optimized more than 900 billion ad transactions for more than 350 of the largest properties on the Internet and is forecasted to reach 500 billion RTB transactions by Q4 2010. REVV helps premium Web publishers like NBC Universal, Time Inc., Gannett and CareerBuilder make more money by optimizing their ad space, eliminate unnecessary ad operations costs and protect their brands. The platform powers the REVV Marketplace, the world’s largest premium display advertising marketplace. More than 600 ad networks, exchanges and DSPs access premium inventory and audiences through the REVV Marketplace and its unparalleled reach of more than 550 million unique users. Headquartered in Los Angeles, with offices in New York, Seattle, London, Paris, Hamburg and Sydney, the company is backed by $60 million in funding from Clearstone Venture Partners, Mayfield Fund, IDG Ventures Asia, GE/NBC Universal’s Peacock Equity Fund and News Corporation.
