If we only had a dollar for every company that said it has the magic formula to monetize online video we sure wouldn't be blogging right now. But some really smart people believe that Adap.tv does have what it takes to monetize that content, and are giving the company $13 million in Series B funding to continue developing their offering.
Adap.tv has developed the OneSource platform, which the company says is the first open and universal video advertising platform. It allows publishers to match their online video inventory from a collective sum of advertising networks based on contextual analysis and past viewer behavior.
The round was led by Spark Capital and also includes existing investors Redpoint Ventures and Gemini Israel Funds. Both of those firms participated in Adap.tv's $10 million Series A round last year. Spark's Dennis Miller will join Adap.tv's board of directors.
As Adap.tv rightly points out, the opportunity for online video advertising is significant. Quoting numbers from online research firm eMarketer, it notes that nearly 67% of U.S. Internet users view online video ads at least once a month and 129.5 million people will watch online video ads this year.
It remains to be seen if Adap.tv can provide the holy grail for online video advertising. But it already has partnerships with more than 300 video Web sites, including BitTorrent, Metacafe, DemandMedia and blip.tv. Now if we could only get them to work on providing a business model for social networks, another platform with lots of eyeballs but few proven ways to monetize them. -- David Shabelman
See July, 2007 press release from Adap.tv
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