Singapore – Independent marketing cloud company InMobi has announced changes in its regional leadership lineup in the Asia-Pacific region. This is to aim at spearheading ad-based monetisation of its owned-and-operated and third-party properties through the InMobi Advertising Platform.

The leadership changes are namely current managing director for APAC Vasuta Agarwal, elevated to the position of SVP and GM of consumer platform advertising; current VP and GM of SEA, Japan and Korea Rishi Bedi, elevated to the position of managing director for APAC; current VP and GM of ANZ Richard O’Sullivan adding the expanded role of VP of agency partnerships in APAC; and current director of marketing in APAC Rajesh Pantina adding the expanded role of leading the B2B marketing charter for InMobi’s Advertising Platform and Solutions in the region.

Speaking about her new role, Agarwal said, “I am excited about this new adventure as we look to push the boundaries with truly first-of-its-kind experiences across connected devices,” shared Vasuta. “This is an opportunity to extend my decade-long experience and expertise in the adtech industry and across diverse markets across the globe, to develop and scale advertising on InMobi’s fast-growing consumer platforms.”

Meanwhile, Bedi commented, “Asia Pacific is one of the most vibrant, thriving, and rapidly evolving adtech markets and we are keen on delivering the best of innovation to brands, publishers, and consumers alike. And we will continue to invest in people, products, and partnerships to make this possible with the InMobi Advertising Platform.”

On the new regional leadership lineup, Abhay Singhal, co-founder at InMobi Group and CEO at InMobi Advertising Platform, said, “Vasuta, Rishi, Richard, and Rajesh have been longstanding members of the InMobi leadership team in APAC, previously holding several key positions and handling multiple businesses and regional growth charters. At InMobi, we constantly recognize leaders from within and empower them with new opportunities to grow and thrive. With these changes, we are well positioned and ready to embrace the significant growth potential that our technology leadership, deep in-market expertise, and unique culture have to offer.”

Singapore – InMobi, an independent marketing cloud company, has recently announced the recent appointment of former executive from video advertising platform Unruly, Valerie Jaquet, as InMobi’s new director of agency and programmatic business in Southeast Asia.

She had a five-year stint at Unruly, where she stood as its vice president for programmatic sales in APAC. Prior to InMobi, she had also worked with global programmatic buying group Dentsu Amnet and media company FairFax. Overall, she brings in over 15 years of digital advertising and programmatic experience. 

Through her new role, Jaquet will be focused on leading regional growth and scaling InMobi’s agency and demand-side platform (DSP) partnerships as well as overseeing the company’s programmatic business and operations.

Speaking about her appointment, she said, “In today’s fast-paced connected consumer landscape, it is imperative for brands and marketers to leverage data and technology in the right manner. InMobi is doubling down on its efforts to build the future of marketing, adtech, and data and I am excited to be part of this change and looking forward to expanding our reach and foothold within Southeast Asia.”

Meanwhile, Rishi Bedi, vice president and GM for Southeast Asia, Japan and Korea at InMobi, commented, “I am happy to welcome Valerie as our new Director and look forward to working together to drive stronger growth across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Philippines markets in 2021. Her rich experience, as both publisher and agency, is complementary to InMobi’s regional growth plans.”

InMobi’s latest appointments come as the Southeast Asian market is becoming a focus market for InMobi, with great growth potential on mobile marketing and programmatic fronts. This has been the case in their recent findings, where they note that mobile ad spending grew by 65% in the region.

Singapore – Pandemic-driven ‘shelter in place’ advisories have pushed the greater majority of Indonesians to try mobile gaming for the first time, making them the new ‘powerhouse’ of said industry, a new report from marketing cloud company InMobi shows.

According to their latest report, over 80% of Indonesian gamers are ‘committed’ as they play once to several times a day, with the 35-44 years old bracket coming out with the highest overall percentage of committed gamers. The gamer demographic is split nearly equally between females and males.

Furthermore, the report also found out that 46% of their Indonesian respondents stated that it is their first time venturing into mobile gaming in general.

In terms of frequency in installing mobile game applications, about 54% of Indonesian respondents have three or more games installed, and 46% of committed gamers download games several times a week. Around 24% of respondents spend over an hour gaming, while the average mobile gamer spends an 11-30 minute ‘snack-sized’ playtime per session.

Rishi Bedi, general manager and vice president of Southeast Asia, Japan, and Korea at InMobi, notes that Indonesia has demonstrated that significant growth potential for mobile gaming in the region was seen due to better accessibility and affordability, as well as the rising demand for ‘snack-sized’ entertainment.

“Gaming is among the biggest opportunities for advertisers across Southeast Asia today. What it provides is not just huge reach, but the ability to access an audience that is highly engaged and receptive to ads in an environment that is completely brand safe and impactful. This, in combination with the richness of mobile, ensures that every brand can drive relevant ad experiences at scale,” Bedi stated.

The report also found that Indonesian gamers are familiar with and receptive to ads during gameplay, with over two-thirds of respondents preferring to watch ads to progress in games instead of paying. At least 62% remembered the ads they had seen when playing mobile games because it catered to their interests, was immersive, or provided them with in-game rewards. 

Within the wider Southeast Asian market, smartphone gaming experienced triple growth in the region during initial lockdowns in April 2020. This also translated into a long-term behavioral shift beyond the pandemic as gaming usage more than doubled year-over-year on average since January 2020 – a significant register as Southeast Asia is home to 250 million mobile gamers.

Singapore – As cities went into lockdown and public gatherings grounded to a halt, mobile device usage has been the daily centerpiece of people’s lifestyle last year, evident with the latest statistics from independent marketing cloud company InMobi that video streaming in the Southeast Asian region has clocked in around 657 billion minutes of views during the second quarter last year.

In its latest report on programmatic video advertising, InMobi reveals that 93.5 million of those views originate from Indonesia, signifying a 57% increase in video streaming in the country, and a 65% growth in mobile video ad spend.

The report also notes that the industries of retail andfast moving consumer goods (FMCG), shopping, e-commerce, gaming, banking and other financial services dominate the mobile video advertising scene in SEA, thanks to fueled growth by advertisers in this sector. Said industries are also benefiting high video ad engagement.

On a general note, the report also found that that 36% of all in-app programmatic spends is accounted for by video, and that 179% of higher click-through rate (CTR) are driven by video compared to other formats.

In terms of video advertising format, the report states that there has been a 47% higher CTR driven by landscape video compared to other formats. Yet this still doesn’t fare well to the vertical format, which has seen an impressive growth of 196% year on year, which is 2x higher CTR driven on vertical video compared to other formats. Vertical videos are the preferred format for marketers from the shopping, social, and gaming industry.

According to Rishi Bedi, vice president of Southeast Asia, Japan, and Korea at InMobi, mobile devices are now able to deliver a near-seamless video experience to users, which is especially significant in Southeast Asia due to the size of the market in the region.

“Brands are realizing the inherent potential of video marketing in creating real connections with their customers. From screen orientation and precision targeting to the best time of day and placement, adopting the right programmatic video ad strategy will be crucial for companies to stand out in the eyes of the mobile-first consumer,” Bedi stated.

Sydney, Australia – As more and more brands seek to measure their brand campaigns across all digital media, marketing cloud InMobi has announced a new partnership with technology company The Trade Desk to cater to this growing need among marketers by making their respective platforms available to clients accordingly.

Through the partnership, InMobi’s mobile-first consumer intelligence platform – InMobi Pulse, will be made available on The Trade Desk’s demand side platform (DSP). Such use of these in-app brand lift surveys that are delivered programmatically can aid brands to measure metrics such as brand awareness, favorability, intent to purchase and other metrics that determine campaign effectiveness.

Vivek Misra, senior director for data partnerships at The Trade Desk said that they are thrilled to partner with InMobi, and aim to make it easy for marketers to access reliable and affordable brand lift studies from within their platform.

“Marketers are under more pressure than ever to demonstrate the impact of their advertising dollars. The Trade Desk is committed to giving advertisers more options to measure the value of their ad spend and prove their marketing investments are driving business results,” Misra said.

Meanwhile, Vasuta Agarwal, managing director for Asia Pacific at InMobi, commented, “This proposition by InMobi Pulse gives digital marketers an efficient, accurate and unbiased means to establish the efficacy of their campaigns. Marketers can accurately deliver in-app surveys to an exposed group which has seen the ads and to a control group which has not seen the ad. Through the difference in brand metrics between the two groups, the true impact of a campaign can be measured.”

InMobi also noted that the brand lift study can be deployed for a single creative or the entire campaign, based on the metrics the brand intends to measure. Advertisers can measure ad recall, awareness, consideration, favourability and purchase intent using the InMobi Pulse BLS on The Trade Desk’s platform.

InMobi’s latest partnership comes in line with the company’s recent goals to take their marketing cloud service globally, which led to the appointment of Krista Thomas as the company’s senior vice president and head of marketing for its marketing cloud division.

At the APAC level, InMobi has also shown its growth in the region, including senior appointments for its ANZ division, and with other corporate partnerships such as with Prebid.org and Gojek.

Singapore – Marketing cloud company InMobi has announced the appointment of Krista Thomas as senior vice president and global head of marketing for its InMobi Marketing Cloud Division.

She brings in 20 years in the media and marketing industries to dramatically expand InMobi Marketing Cloud’s global awareness and influence, optimize customer acquisition, and launch innovative new solutions that leverage InMobi’s end-to-end advertising solutions to activate audiences, drive meaningful connections, and ignite growth.

Thomas is previously the SVP for marketing of advertising platform Amobee where she helped define the company’s TV-first strategy, help build a world-class marketing discipline, and relaunch the brand’s positioning and messaging in support of its CTV Allocator solution. 

She also served as SVP for marketing of software company VideoAmp and asn VP for product marketing of Rubicon Project (now Magnite) which she helped go public in 2014 and where she collaborated closely with InMobi to launch and drive the adoption of programmatic mobile and video advertising around the world.

Speaking about her appointment, Krista said, “InMobi Marketing Cloud has delivered steady growth around the world, extending its lead as a top three mobile advertising provider and the only one fully committed to transparency and an open media ecosystem.”

She added, “As vaccines continue to roll-out and doors reopen, businesses everywhere are seeking partners that can help them re-engage and reignite their audiences to take or defend market share. InMobi is that partner, and now is the time.”

Meanwhile, Abhay Singhal, co-founder of InMobi Group and CEO at InMobi Marketing Cloud commented, “As InMobi builds toward its next phase of growth, we are thrilled to welcome Krista to the executive team as InMobi Marketing Cloud’s first Global Head of Marketing. She will play an instrumental role in advancing our mission to drive real connections between brands and consumers through intelligent, mobile-first experiences.”