LONDON – Polar (www.polar.me) has hired Tom Jenen as President, International to lead Polar’s fast-expanding global business.
Tom Jenen has nearly 20 years of experience leading digital media and advertising technology sales and marketing organizations in the USA and global markets, especially EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa). For most of that time, he has focused on bringing value to publishers in those markets. Most recently, Jenen was Head of Marketplace Development for Northern Europe at Google, helping lead strategy and execution for Google’s premium programmatic business. Before that, Jenen launched Admeld (acquired by Google in 2011) in Europe, helping publishers in 16 countries boost ad revenue through its sell-side platform.
“Programmatic has been a true transformation for publishers, but that job is done. Where will publishers make revenue in the *next* five years? I was looking for an opportunity to help develop truly innovative technology solutions to that problem, and at Polar we have a chance to do exactly that. It’s a perfect fit,” said Jenen.
Europe represents a large amount of Polar’s business with premium publishers such as The Telegraph, Time Inc. UK, Haymarket, Hearst UK, Scripps Networks Interactive, and The Economist Group using Polar’s platform to grow revenue and boost value from their content and brands. With Jenen looking to expand Polar’s European presence in the coming months, the company expects that number to grow to 50 percent.
“Tom’s joining the team lets us instantly tap into a vast knowledge of the UK and Europe’s digital publishing industry. Tom knows exactly what our potential customers need in a platform, and what our current customers need to bring their content revenue initiatives to scale,” said Kunal Gupta, CEO, Polar.
“Whether it’s RTB at Admeld or premium programmatic at Google, Tom’s always been at the forefront of revenue innovation for publishers,” says Sandip Ray, Commercial Product & Operations Director at Haymarket Consumer Media. “Polar’s content marketing platform already is helping us drive huge value for marketers, so we’re looking forward to Tom’s insights to help bring our sponsored content business to the next level.”
UK digital ad-spend hit £7.2-billion ($11.2-billion USD) in 2014 with only 11% of that spend occurring on mobile. With eMarketer predicting both those numbers trending upwards, publishers need help preparing their content-monetization for 2015, and beyond. Polar helps publishers realize their full revenue potential.
About Polar
Polar empowers premium publishers to maximize their revenue goals by managing and optimizing their digital advertising inventory. With MediaVoice, the industries’ leading native advertising platform, and MediaConductor, used by publishers to manage and optimize multiple third-party demand sources, Polar solutions provide inventory control, reporting services, optimization, and content creation tools to manage and increase revenue across all devices. Having worked directly with over 700 brands, Polar Powers Publishers. Learn more at www.polar.me/about-us and follow us on Twitter @aboutpolar.
