This week’s Latin American Roundup: a new survey shows that the number of Brazilians who avoid clicking on digital ads has dropped from 41% to 32% this year; Brazilian publisher Globo Group acquires Valor Economico website and newspaper from Folha de São Paulo; and new hires in the local programmatic market at IgnitionOne LATAM and Mercado Livre.

Brazilian internet users are keen to accept digital ads

Even though ad-blocker adoption has been growing worldwide, the media sector has numbers to support digital operations in Brazil. According to the MMA Mobile Report Brazil 2016, released last week during IAB Brazil’s Ad Tech and Data, the number of Brazilian internet users who affirmed avoiding clicking on online ads has dropped from 41% to 32%.

The report was made by Millward Brown Brasil and NetQuest, which polled 1,200 people between 14 and 55 years old who own a smartphone and/or a tablet.

The survey revealed that people tend to pay more attention to ads in digital media than in offline media. The report also supports that Brazilians are more open and receptive to digital ads, alongside Colombians in Latin America; whereas countries like Argentina have more challenges.

Brazilian users also affirmed using more apps regularly: eight, compared to six in 2015’s report. The main activities on mobile devices are internet browsing (87%), email (85%), telephone calls (89%), and news searching or browsing (71%).

As expected, millennials are the age group who spend more time using their devices: four hours a day, on average.

Brazilian publisher Globo Group acquires Valor Economico

The Brazilian Publisher Globo Group became the sole proprietary owner of Valor Economico newspaper and website. The company had already 50% of Valor’s stakes; but, earlier this week, it acquired the remaining half that belonged to other local publisher, Folha de São Paulo.

Valor Economico is a publisher specialising in business and economy news, launched in 2000 as a joint-venture between Globo and Folha de São Paulo. The buyout still needs to go through the Brazilian regulatory agency Cade. They didn’t disclose the value of the acquisition.

Globo Group are a media giant headquartered in Brazil. The company owns several online publishers, such as G1, Globo Esporte, and O Globo, as well as the main Brazilian TV broadcaster, Globo TV.

New hires in LATAM programmatic players

Earlier last week, IgnitionOne announced the expansion of the Brazilian offices through new hires. Camila Di Cezar joins the team as marketing coordinator for Latin America, and Carolina Fogaça steps in as senior account manager LATAM.

Di Cezar has built her career in b2b marketing, having worked at Media Response Group, Columbia Trading and TerraCycle. Fogaça, on the other hand, accumulates 10 years in the digital field and has worked in Wunderman agency and in the local service provider Aunica.

Another company with recent new hires is Mercado Livre, Brazilian e-commerce. Diego Forte joins the team as executive account manager, reporting to Alexandre Mendonça. Forte has a strong sales background, and in his previous work experience has worked as sales manager at Afilio, Predicta, the publisher IG. His main goal will be expanding programmatic media in Mercado Livre.