Ad tech evolution continues with Avid Media’s new DSP for content

(Updated 6.27.16 to reflect additional input from the CEOs of Avid and Zemanta)

On the constantly evolving ad tech front: London-based Avid Media has announced a demand-side platform (DSP) entirely devoted to content, while supply-side platform PubMatic in Redwood City, California, has expanded on its private marketplace portfolio.

Called Spartan, Avid’s programmatic platform for web and apps is a self-serve version of what the company has been using internally. It can be employed to address any other demand or supply platform, Chief Business Development Officer Lucy Hemming told me, and its user interface can be customized for the requirements of agencies, trading desks, or advertisers.

Avid CEO Nick Brown told me that Spartan is the first DSP for “native delivery” of any content, meaning that the content is matched to the surrounding editorial in topic and, on occasion, style. The content can include white papers, how-to guides, editorials, sponsored content (which others might call “native ads”), reviews, and so on.

However, Todd Sawicki, CEO of New York City-based Zemanta, pointed out that his company — as well as StackAdapt, Keywee, and several others — also offer buying platforms for the distribution of content that falls inside or outside of the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s native ad spec.

In addition to such features as campaign frequency capping and retargeting, Avid’s platform can also automatically understand content context via plugins, so as to serve the most appropriate material. Spartan can also automatically mine and reformat content from sponsor sources, such as webpages or YouTube, which is then manually checked by Avid staff before going out. (By the way, Avid Media has no relation to the maker of the well-known Avid Media Composer video editing system.)

Here’s a screen from the Spartan guide:

Meanwhile, over in the world of supply-side platforms for publishers, PubMatic announced this week it is launching Private Marketplace Guaranteed (PMP-G).

PMP-G adds to the company’s previous private marketplace, which offers real-time bidding for direct sold media. The difference is that this one is for guaranteed buys in which the advertiser’s spend and the publisher’s impressions have already been set, and the details are being programmatically worked out.

Director of Product Marketing Hussain Rahim told me that, with the addition of PMP-G, PubMatic becomes “the only technology company with the entire range of programmatic methods for SSP” — PMP, PMP-G and Automated Guaranteed — which automatically processes direct sales without real-time bidding.