Tag: NBCUniversal

New York, USA – Integral Ad Science (IAS) and Anzu have recently announced a partnership to enable global brands and agencies to effectively monitor the quality of their in-game media investments in mobile gaming environments.

Through this collaboration, IAS provides advertisers with Invalid Traffic (IVT) measurement and reports on Viewability through the IAS Signal platform.

This strategic collaboration further delivers ad transparency into mobile gaming environments, continuing IAS’s progress related to in-game brand safety, suitability, IVT, and viewability measurement everywhere in the digital advertising ecosystem. 

Tom Sharma, chief product officer at IAS, said, “Gaming continues to emerge as a medium with broad appeal and growing reach. By partnering with Anzu, we now deliver in-game measurement and transparency for advertisers within gaming environments. This integration sets the platform for quality standards within ad-supported gaming and allows advertisers to better understand and control the quality of their media on Anzu.”

Meanwhile, Itamar Benedy, co-founder and CEO of Anzu, commented, “Anzu’s new partnership with IAS is the next step in standardising in-game viewability and performance in the mobile gaming industry, which is projected to reach $136 billion worldwide this year. This new partnership means advertisers can now get enhanced visibility into the effectiveness of their campaigns. This further strengthens the already robust metrics and reporting advertisers benefit from when running in-game ad campaigns with Anzu.”

Lastly, Joe Cady, EVP of advanced advertising and partnerships at NBCUniversal, commented, “This important measurement advancement will help accelerate advertisers’ ability to scale their in-game media investments by further demonstrating the high performance of the Anzu platform. We are excited to see Anzu and IAS partner to expand insights and streamline measurement operations for marketers as they evaluate their in-game media effectiveness.”

Tel Aviv, Israel – In-game advertising platform Anzu has announced that it has raised US$20m in funding, bringing its total capitalization to US$37m since 2017. The funding will be used to continue its work as a global in-game advertising platform.

The funding round was led by two global brands namely entertainment company NBCUniversal and technology company HTC. It should be recalled that Anzu and NBCUniversal entered into a partnership to allow the brand’s marketing partners to run non-intrusive, in-game ads across Anzu’s cross-platform gaming inventory, which spans mobile, PC and consoles.

Itamar Benedy, CEO and co-founder at Anzu, said, “Everyone is talking about the impending metaverse, and we are starting to see it emerge from several different angles. However, if you want to see it in action right now, you just need to look to today’s most popular gaming platforms, which are hosting virtual concerts and film screenings. This funding will further expand our in-game advertising solution, helping even more advertisers understand where their brand fits in, and how they navigate these immersive, digitally-connected spaces.”

Other investors include WPP, Sony Innovation Fund, BITKRAFT Ventures, HBSE Ventures, Alumni Ventures Group, the iconic baseball team The Chicago Cubs, Goal Ventures, and a prominent angel investor Marc Merrill, the co-founder, co-chairman, and president of games at Riot Games. As with the previous round, all investors will act as strategic partners, while Anzu will remain an independent company.

Benedy added, “I am proud to have iconic investors who share in Anzu’s vision and enable us to bring in-game advertising and our best-class tech to more gaming platforms and global brands. Our last investment round helped us achieve some monumental milestones, including bringing in-game advertising to Roblox, becoming the first advertising platform to be verified by Unity, extending our partnership with Ubisoft, and launching new partnerships with leading games studios, including Saber Interactive for its AAA game Dakar Desert Rally.”

New York, USA – NBCUniversal, a popular global media and technology company, has unveiled a new partnership with Anzu.io, an in-game advertising platform to further enrich NBCUniversal’s capabilities in growing entertainment areas like gaming and esports. 

NBCUniversal enlists the strategic partnership with Anzu as a global sales partner and the exclusive third-party seller in the US and UK. Now, NBCUniversal’s clients will be able to run non-intrusive, in-game ads across Anzu’s cross-platform gaming inventory— which spans mobile, PC and consoles—and use interactive, data-driven, contextual, and programmatic in-game advertising solutions, all with the high standards of privacy and brand safety they’ve come to expect from NBCUniversal’s One Platform.

Moreover, partners will also have access to Anzu’s full suite of leading adtech integrations as well as its robust measurement—including ad viewability, brand lift measurement, audience verification, data enrichment, and fraud detection—powered by Anzu’s partnerships with trusted industry leaders like Moat, Comscore, Human, Lumen, and Kochava.

Krishan Bhatia, president & chief business officer of NBCUniversal, shared, “NBCUniversal continues to reach consumers at scale on any platform and on every screen. In addition to streaming, gaming is one of the fastest growing ways to reach young audiences.” 

“This partnership with Anzu will allow our marketers to engage with an audience of over three billion gamers worldwide, and we’re only getting started,” Bhatia added.

As part of the deal, Anzu will be able to access the power of NBCUniversal’s One Platform, including its client and agency relationships, and marketing teams. Meanwhile, Anzu’s cross-platform ad monetization solution will help game developers generate significant revenue while respecting their players and adding to the overall gaming experience.

Itamar Benedy, co-founder & ceo of Anzu, commented, “We’re excited to bring our best-in-class tech and exclusive inventory to one of the world’s leading ad sales teams. This new partnership means more brands and agencies will be able to take advantage of our solution to reach an engaged and untapped audience within the world’s most popular titles while preserving the gamer experience. We also believe, over the next few years, most Fortune 500 brands will incorporate gaming into their ad strategies and the partnership with NBCUniversal brings us a step closer to this becoming a reality.”

This latest partnership announcement comes in the run up to NBCUniversal’s tech developer conference, ONE22 taking place on March 22nd, where the company is expected to announce its latest capabilities and partnerships in the data, technology, and measurement space.