Adform Continues International Expansion With Opening of Portuguese Office

Display advertising specialist Adform announced last week their opening a new regional office in Lisbon, Portugal. The move comes as a result of an increase in media agencies and online advertisers looking for local support in running display marketing campaigns in the Portuguese market, which previously had been largely run out of Spain.

Adform will enable Portuguese clients to more readily run campaigns through its single platform that hosts a complete gamut of services for display advertising, from traditional ad serving to real time bidding, to dynamic creative optimisation, to rich media and attribution.

To open the new office, Adform has recruited Jose Fradé as its new Business Development Director for Portugal. Fradé will be largely responsible for the opening and development of the local Adform office in Lisbon, looking to complement the rapid growth achieved in the neighbouring Spanish market.

Fradé joins Adform from Havas Digital Portugal, where he was Country Manager working with clients including Peugeot, Citroên, Nike, Reckitt and Barclays. Fradé will report to David Fulton, Adform’s Chief Commercial Officer.

Fradé comments: “The boom in real time bidding across major markets in Europe is now prompting a similar response in Portugal, with publishers looking for solutions to sell their remnant inventory and get more revenue. These changes in the buying landscape together with an influx of creative rich media innovations in how display campaigns are run, provides the perfect base for success in delivering effective campaigns for media agencies and online advertisers alike.”

Fulton adds: “Our local presence in the European markets is a major advantage. Our new Lisbon office will offer the Portuguese display advertising market greater local support and flexibility, meaning we are swift to turnaround responses to any client requests. We have our ears to the ground in terms of what are the best technology developments for our clients so that we can provide services that reflect the local and European needs of our customer base.”

Mark Your Calendars for DoubleClick Insights on June 5

DoubleClick see unprecedented opportunity as the digital media world continues to grow and diversify. What does this mean for the future of buying and selling ads online?

DoubleClick invites everyone to tune in and find out as Google's Neal Mohan, VP of Display Advertising, sits down with industry leaders to explore how the digital ecosystem is swiftly evolving, and how advertisers and publishers can work better together to chart a path to capitalise on every opportunity, while simultaneously addressing the challenges we face.

The live stream will start on June 5, 2012, at 9:00 am PDT, and you’ll be able to watch from your computer, tablet, or mobile device.

You can register for this virtual event by visiting the DoubleClick Insights Live Stream page.

DoubleClick Insights
Tuesday, June 5th 2012
9:00am - 1:00pm PST

Hashtag for event: #dclkinsights

Your Adobe’s on Fire: Five New Announcements

- Adobe Digital Index Report: Tablet traffic has grown 10x faster than smartphone traffic
Adobe has just announced findings from its most recent Adobe® Digital Index report examining how global website traffic and engagement differ when the visitor is on a tablet, smartphone or personal computer (PC). The report found that tablet devices will generate more Web traffic than smartphones by early 2013, and that consumers find browsing websites on tablets nearly as engaging as on PCs.

The results indicate that tablets have become a channel very distinct from smartphones. While apps have proven a highly valuable and important component of a mobile strategy, companies would be well served to invest in optimising mobile Web pages for the growing and affluent tablet demographic.

- Adobe CQ Cloud Manager
Adobe announced last week the availability of Adobe® CQ Cloud Manager, a Software-as-a-Service application that provides enterprises the ability to easily and quickly launch marketing initiatives in the cloud. With CQ Cloud Manager, part of the Adobe Digital Marketing Suite, digital marketers have access to an integrated set of cloud-hosted Web Experience Management (WEM) services to create, manage, measure and optimise personalised experiences on websites, mobile devices and social media.

- Adobe TagManager privacy solution for digital advertisers and publishers
Adobe announced last week enhancements to Adobe® TagManager, creating a flexible privacy solution that helps digital advertisers and publishers give consumers notice and control over how their data is used online. The solution will initially focus on managing third-party cookies used for behavioral advertising, a requirement of the ePrivacy Directive. Having a flexible, rapidly deployable privacy solution is proving essential for digital advertisers to address privacy issues in an evolving landscape. This is especially true for global companies operating in multiple geographies. Adobe TagManager can help digital advertisers quickly and easily configure data collection practices by geography.

- Adobe CQ5.5 Social Communities
Adobe also announced last week Adobe® CQ 5.5 Social Communities, providing digital marketers with the ability to better leverage social engagement across owned digital properties to build loyalty and drive conversion. Part of the Adobe Web Experience Managementsolution, CQ Social Communities enables organisations to build deeper relationships with and between customers by connecting context from leading social networks to multiple marketing channels, including company websites, mobiles sites and applications.

- Adobe CQ eCommerce
And finally, Adobe announced the availability of Adobe® CQ eCommerce, providing digital marketers capabilities for managing and optimising the entire buying process on websites, mobile devices and social media. With Adobe Web Experience Management (WEM), part of the Adobe Digital Marketing Suite, organisations can now quickly deliver branded, personalised experiences across online channels that incorporate powerful e-commerce functionality. Adobe CQ eCommerce comes integrated with market-leading technology from hybris, a provider of multichannel commerce and communication software.

Japanese NTT Docomo to Acquire Italian Mobile Content Company Buongiorno

Mobile carrier NTT Docomo announced last week a move in its strategy to grow its content business outside of its traditional base in Japan: it issued a tender offer to acquire Buongiorno, a mobile content company based in Italy, paying up to ¥24 billion ($300m) for the assets.

Docomo notes in a statement that the acquisition would be made by its Germany-based subsidiary, Docomo Deutschland, and that Maruo del Rio, Buongiorno’s majority shareholder and chairman with 20% of Buongiorno’s stock, has already agreed to sell his stake to the carrier. The deal would see Buongiorno become a subsidiary of NTT Docomo.

This is not the first time Docomo has made moves to build up its European/rest-of-world business in mobile content, but it is an area that has been lying somewhat dormant for a while. A decade ago, well before the mobile world was hit with the revolution that became the iPhone and then Android following closely behind, Docomo made a foray to bring its popular i-mode mobile content service to the Continent, starting out first with a partnership with France’s Bouygues Telecom with plans to extend that to other markets.

That never really followed through as a successful business, though, when the game for mobile content changed from “walled gardens” run by operators to app stores run by the handset makers. Since then, Docomo has also been involved in an LTE chip joint venture (with Samsung) that ended last month, as well as other European initiatives.

For example, it inked a partnership with France Telecom’s Orange to co-sell a Sharp 3D handset, the Aquos SH80F. And it also owns, in Germany, a mobile payments business net mobile, which in September 2011 got an investment from Docomo of €28.4m, so that it could in turn take a controlling stake in Bankverein Werther, a private German bank with e-commerce and payment service operations.

As Docomo announced in a statement at the time: “Utilizing Bankverein Werther’s existing banking license and credit card licenses, as well as the bank’s main systems, net mobile will be able to greatly enhance its mobile payment platform.”

This time around it looks like Docomo, which has 60 million customers in its home market, wants another local/international partner to help export its business model more effectively.

Buongiorno is one of the oldest mobile content companies around, first being established back in 1999 and currently employing 848 people. And it is profitable: in 2011 it reported revenues of €228.6 million (¥24.52bn; $295m) and operating profit of €7m (¥7.5bn; $9m).

Its services — which include a sprawling list of direct-to-consumer offerings and those it creates in partnership with carriers and others — cover gaming, music, casual content like wallpapers and ringtones, and mobile payments. Its services are used by some 2 billion customers in 57 countries across four continents, the company says, and you can see how this distribution channel could get used by Docomo for the services that it has created itself, in addition to those from Buongiorno.

Docomo notes in its statement: “The acquisition will combine Docomo’s innovative mobile business and services know-how in Japan and other countries with Buongiorno’s advanced mobile technologies and extensive global customer base. As part of expanding the businesses of both companies, Docomo expects to strengthen the foundation of its mobile platform businesses overseas.”

This is also part of the ongoing trend that we are seeing from the likes of other carriers, like Telefonica, to create new lines of revenue that take operators beyond their traditional business of mobile voice and data sales in their traditional geographic footprints. Telefonica last week launched TU-Me new app that offers an all-in-one free voice, text, photosharing offering to all iPhone owners that it hopes can help it snag a new base of users.

Pending regulatory approval, Docomo says that it will officially begin its tender offer at €2 per share, which will last 25 days. Del Rio’s 20 percent holding is equivalent to 111,888,895 shares in Buongiorno.

Yell Acquires Moonfruit

Yell, a leading provider of digital services, announced last week a further important step in its creation of a local eMarketplace with the acquisition of Moonfruit Limited, a leading UK DIY website and online shop builder. The total cash consideration for the acquisition is approximately £18m, funded out of Yell’s cash reserves. Retention bonuses of up to £5.2m will be paid to key Moonfruit management after two years, provided they remain exclusively employed by Yell.

The deal is a significant move in Yell’s ongoing transformation from its established position in providing print and online advertising for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to become a leader in the emerging local eMarketplace. The eMarketplace comprises an innovative platform and digital portal where consumers and SMEs can connect and transact. This acquisition helps Yell secure the foundations for this strategy by significantly enhancing its ability to provide cutting edge websites, mobile sites and simple - “light” - commerce services to millions of SMEs.

The deal complements Yell’s acquisition of multi-store ecommerce leader Znode last year. While Znode technology is providing SMEs with enterprise opportunities through its ecommerce platform, Moonfruit offers them “light” commerce, and the opportunity to enhance their presence online, on mobile and on social. This makes the eMarketplace more accessible to more merchants, enhancing the consumer experience.

The deal provides Yell with potential future cost efficiencies and enhanced capability in areas such as website construction, proofing and editing, reflecting the calibre of Moonfruit’s platform. The deal accelerates Moonfruit’s own expansion worldwide, building on its rapid growth in the UK and U.S.

Mike Pocock, Chief Executive Officer of Yell, comments:: “We believe there are significant strategic, cultural and operating synergies between Yell and Moonfruit. The addition of Moonfruit’s services and team helps us provide competitive advantage to our global SME customers in connecting with consumers through digital, mobile and social.”

Moonfruit’s website Moonfruit.com was launched in the UK in 2000 with a mission to make the web easily accessible for local businesses and consumers. When a customer builds a Moonfruit site, with a click of a button they can add a commerce option, a mobile presence and build a Facebook store, all from the same platform.

Nearly five million websites and 230,000 online shops, mainly in the UK and U.S., have been created using Moonfruit.com technology. Updated HTML5 versions of their sites that build on their existing HTML5 mobile and Facebook versions will be launched later this year.

Yell is acquiring Moonfruit’s technology as well as its technical and design teams. Moonfruit.com will remain a sub-brand. Moonfruit co-founders Chief Executive Officer Wendy Tan-White, Chief Operating Officer Joe White and Chief Technology Officer Eirik Pettersen will take senior roles in Yell Group. Wendy Tan-White and Joe White will report directly to Scott Moore, who joined Yell last December in the new global role of Chief Digital Officer. Scott was previously Partner and Executive Producer at MSN, having held senior roles at Yahoo! and Microsoft businesses.

Wendy Tan-White, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Moonfruit, adds: “We built Moonfruit to make it easy to publish and sell on the internet, and provide stylish web, blog and shop designs as well as easy-to-use web tools for SMEs. Joining Yell and integrating with its local eMarketplace provides access to larger audiences and additional resource to accelerate what is a common vision for the future.”

Moonfruit took £1.57m in funding in 2010 from investors Stephens(US) and Silicon Valley-based angels – Dave McClure 500 Startups, Robbie Van-Adibe and Theorem.