AOL to buy video ad platform Adap.tv

America Online (AOL), once an internet titan, today said that it will acquire video advertising platform Adap.tv, in a $405-million cash-and-stock deal.

Amir Ashkenazi, CEO, Adap.tv (left) and Tim Armstrong, Chairman & CEO, AOL (right) (Photo: Business Wire)

The deal, which is expected to close in the third quarter of 2013, comprises around $322 million in cash and approximately $83 million in AOL common stock.

Based in California, privately-held Adap.tv is the video advertising platform that is being used by the world's largest brands, agencies, publishers and ad networks.

It provides buyers and sellers with automated tools to plan, buy and measure across linear TV and online video, which helps them gauge how video advertising is bought and sold.

Named by Inc. magazine as the fastest-growing video advertising company in the US in its ''Inc 500'' 2012 annual ranking on private companies, Adap.tv also earned the''Fastest-Growing Private Company in Silicon Valley'' ranking by the editors of the Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal.

In 2012, Adap.tv supported more than 26,000 global ad campaigns, which ran on approximately 9,500 websites and was used by many top brand advertisers.

With offices in the US, Australia, India and London, Adap.tv is backed by Bessemer Venture Partners, Gemini Israel Funds, Redpoint Ventures and Spark Capital.

Adap.tv will operate independently as part of AOL's video organisation led by Ran Harnevo, SVP, Video, and will be included as part of the overall solution offered by AOL Networks to its publisher and advertiser partners.

AOL said that the acquisition will give it ''a unique end-to-end solution and video stack for publishers and advertisers – from premium original production, to content aggregation and syndication platforms, robust video CMS technology, and now a leading programmatic video platform.''

AOL has invested heavily in the digital video space by focusing exclusively on premium content and premium publishers, which has pushed AOL On Network to the second-largest monthly content video views in the US for the past nine months.

"AOL is a leader in online video and the combination of AOL and Adap.tv will create the leading video platform in the industry," said Tim Armstrong, chairman and CEO of AOL. "The Adap.tv founders and team are on a mission to make advertising as easy as e-commerce and the two companies together will aggressively pursue that vision.

 ''At Adap.tv, we are focused on building the most important business within the most important category in digital advertising,'' said Amir Ashkenazi, CEO, Adap.tv. ''We believe that most TV advertising will soon be traded programmatically on platforms like ours. The combination of AOL and Adap.tv accelerates our vision of efficient and effective TV and video advertising.''