In this weekly segment, ExchangeWire sums up key industry updates on ad tech from around the Asia-Pacific region – and in this edition: Ads leaving bad taste among APAC consumers; IAB AU & Nielsen launch audience metrics; Dentsu makes two acquisitions in Malaysia; STW to merge with WPP ANZ; Eyeota unveils audience data index; and LinkedIn opens data centre in Singapore.

Ads leaving bad taste among APAC consumers

Ads are generating negative user experience towards brands; with 80% of consumers in Southeast Asia, Australia, and New Zealand leaving websites due to interruptive online ads.

According to further research findings from HubSpot, 96% of consumers worldwide had unsubscribed from receiving marketing email, with 46% of Asia-Pacific consumers indicating that they did not sign-up for the email in the first place.

Some 66% of consumers in this region also had negative sentiments towards telemarketing calls, while 51% felt likewise about pop-ups, and 40% with auto-playing video ads. Another 75% said they would have a worse opinion of brands that subjected them to telemarketing calls.

Worldwide, ad blocking was estimated to cost publishers USD$22bn (£15.6bn) last year.

HubSpot's Asia-Pacific marketing director Ryan Bonnici said: "As long as there are products to market, advertisements will never disappear, but advertisers must listen to the consumers, as they evolve and their behavioural traits change.

"Marketers who want to connect with potential customers, or maintain existing relationships with loyal customers, need to get smart about their digital ad spend, supplementing, and enhancing the online experience, not interrupting it", Bonnici said.

He added that consumers today could easily unsubscribe from marketing email, skip commercials, screen telemarketing calls, and block online ads. This ability to control how brands interacted with them underscored the need for marketers to identify new ways to meaningfully engage their target audience, he said.

According to HubSpot, ads such as email newsletters or sponsored content appearing on Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter, produced an unobtrusive user experience. There was also a preference for native ads among digital consumers.

IAB AU & Nielsen launch audience metrics

IAB Australia and Nielsen have unveiled a digital audience measurement currency to provide a glimpse of the country's digital audience across PCs, smartphones, and tablets on web browsers and apps.

Called Digital Ratings, the tool would provide data integrated with Nielsen's pre-existing PC panel for home and work, and nationally representative panels of Australia's smartphone and tablet web users, as well as census-tagged data for PC and mobile web.

The metrics would offer an independent, cross-device view of the country's total digital audience, IAB said, adding that the data would allow publishers to understand how their audiences had grown across all digital devices. It also would facilitate more accurate decision-making among agencies and advertisers, which could better assess the reach of their digital campaigns.

According to the latest monthly Digital Ratings, Australia's active digital universe for February 2016 clocked at almost 19.6 million users across PCs, smartphones, and tablets. Consumers in the country also spent more time browsing websites and apps on their smartphones than any other device, with each person spending more than 28 hours per month.

The latest Digital Ratings release followed IAB and Nielsen's previous launch of Australia's mobile and tablet audience data. The third and final release would see the availability of Digital Content Ratings, which would tap data from third-party providers.

Nielsen's head of media Monique Perry said: "This will be the holy grail of digital total audience measurement. It will see the Australian market transition to daily delivery of digital audience data, across sites big and small."

Dentsu makes two acquisitions in Malaysia

Dentsu Aegis Network has made two acquisitions in Malaysia, adding a creative agency as well as digital marketing agency to its portfolio.

The Japanese group said it had reached an agreement to acquire Merdeka, a creative agency that was founded in 2013, to offer advertising and communications services, including brand consulting and creative production.

With the acquisition, Merdeka would be folded into Dentsu Malaysia to form Dentsu LHS, becoming part of Dentsu Branded Agencies. It would work alongside the group's other companies in Malaysia to drive the network's growth plans in the market.

In a separate announcement, Dentsu said it had acquired a 51% stake in Kuala Lumpur-based digital marketing agency, Consider Digital, with an option to increase its share to 100% at a later date.

The Malaysian agency was founded in 2013, offering digital advertising and marketing services in areas such as social media, content marketing, data analytics, and e-commerce.

Following the acquisition, Consider Digital would become part of Dentsu's performance marketing unit, iProspect, and be rebranded Consider iProspect.

STW to merge with WPP AUNZ

STW Communications Group will merge with WPP's Australia and New Zealand businesses, following the former's shareholder approval this week.

With the merger, STW would become the main vehicle for WPP in the two countries, the latter of which would hold the majority 61.5% stake.

To be renamed WPP AUNZ, the merged entity would have a headcount of more than 5,500 and combined revenue of AUD$850m (£451.1m). The acquisition was expected to be completed soon, with the official renaming to be rolled out after shareholder approval in late-May.

WPP AUNZ CEO Michael Connaghan said: "We believe this is a great deal for all stakeholders. This merger will drive growth, extend our reach, significantly increase the scale of our operations, and position WPP AUNZ as the clear market leader."

WPP AUNZ Chairman Robert Mactier added: "A lot of integration planning has been going on ahead of [the] shareholder meeting and with the approval of the merger, we can now get on with the job of delivering the benefits and synergies for all our shareholders."

Eyeota unveils audience data index

The Singapore-based audience data services provider has launched its Eyeota Index, offering its first year-on-year comparisons of audience data usage throughout 2015.

The index analysed spend by sector and price, tracking campaigns that were rolled out by agencies across 60 countries last year.

According to Eyeota, the Asia-Pacific's adoption of audience data expanded 81% between the fourth quarters of 2014 and 2015. Its growth was fuelled by a maturing region and overall growth potential, specifically within Southeast Asia, which grew 351%.

Across Asia-Pacific, the top three biggest industry spenders were from finance, electronics & computers, and services & utilities. The most popular audience data categories were sociodemographics, which accounted for 56% of total deployment, and business-to-business, which accounted for 16%.

Eyeota CEO Kevin Tan said: "There is massive potential for Asia-Pacific, where audience data usage is relatively new in areas such as Southeast Asia. More brands are adopting data-driven marketing strategies and recognising how audience data can elevate their programmatic ad buying efforts."

LinkedIn opens data centre in Singapore

The professional social media network has launched its first data centre facility outside the US in Singapore; which will support its online traffic in Asia-Pacific.

Spanning 23,500 square feet, the new facility cost SGD$80m (£41.3m) and was built to support its growing member and customer base in the region, the company said.

According to LinkedIn, its membership grew more than double since January 2013 to 85 million in end-2015, including 16 million in Southeast Asia, 34 million in India, and seven million in Australia.

"Asia-Pacific is our fastest-growing region, in terms of member base outside of the US", said LinkedIn's Asia-Pacific managing director, Olivier Legrand, who is also a council member in the Singapore chapter of Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). "We are investing to make sure we continue to provide a great experience as our business continues to grow in this region."

Singapore currently serves as the company's Asia-Pacific headquarters.