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DSP Oath Mergers and Acquisitions

Oath will consolidate its DSPs into one streamlined proposition by the end of next year

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By Rebecca Stewart, Trends Editor

October 3, 2017 | 4 min read

Oath has confirmed that it will combine the multiple DSPs it currently operates under one umbrella, a process The Drum understands the company hopes to complete by the end of 2018.

Oath will consolidate its DSPs into one streamlined proposition by the end of next year

Oath will consolidate its DSPs into one streamlined proposition by the end of next year

With just over 100 days since the ink officially dried on the $4.5bn AOL and Yahoo merger, there are still many moving parts for both brands to stitch together.

However, speaking to The Drum after Oath’s first IAB Upfront event on Tuesday (3 October) the tech giant’s UK managing director Nigel Clarkson confirmed that streamlining its ad tech capabilities on the demand-side is a priority.

Noting that there have been a lot of mergers and acquisitions from both Yahoo and AOL in the adtech space – with the respective parties housing their adtech brands within BrightRoll, and One by AOL respectively – it will have a more simplified offering in 2018.

Unable to offer few precise details, Clarkson did say the current plan is to offer one DSP and two ad exchanges, one of which will be video and the other mobile.

He further revealed that this decision was taken given that the overall feedback from the market had “made it very clear” that advertisers want one tech proposition from Oath.

“We are moving towards one DSP solution whereby all of that data, all of that content, all that rich targeting capability will be able to go through one DSP. That changes the game and gives [advertisers] a genuine alternative to everything else that’s out there,” he said.

“We’re undercooked at the moment, there is great focus being spared by the engineers on getting this consolidated tech in place, that is definitely the ambition behind the scenes,” he continued.

Oath, which released its first global campaign last week to coincide with Advertising Week New York is now pitching itself to advertisers as a brand building platform. Later in the same week, Oath chief executive officer Tim Armstrong offered conference attendees some more detail on the tests it is currently running to improve its offering to advertisers.

Earlier this year, the company's chief marketing officer Allie Kline, who oversees the image of its extensive portfolio which includes Tumblr, Yahoo Sports and HuffPost, said Oath wanted to be the P&G of media technology.

"If we do this, we achieve a few things. First and foremost, we allow brands to have all the consumer focus they deserve and to really dominate the consumer relationship, and we allow employees, no matter which brand [they] work on…[to] still feel part of a larger community of premium brands by being part of the Oath family and…it allows brands to understand everything in our house," she told The Drum at the time.

Meanwhile, Verizon has revealed that all of Yahoo's 3 billion user accounts were affected by the 2013 hack, the largest in history.

DSP Oath Mergers and Acquisitions

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