Imagine Communications has acquired the OpenTV advanced advertising business from the Kudelski Group. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Kudelski will focus on its core business of content security, while Imagine Communications, born out of the former Harris Broadcast company, aims to expand its product portfolio.
Founded in 1994, OpenTV was an early pioneer of interactive television middleware, born out of an alliance between Thomson Multimedia and Sun Microsystems, and expanded into interactive and addressable advertising. In 2010 it became a fully owned subsidiary of the Kudelski Group, the Swiss company that includes the Nagra content security business.
The assets acquired by Imagine Communications include the EclipsePlus range of software products for managing advertising campaigns. They are used to manage around $3 billion of advertising revenue a year.
“The acquisition of OpenTV’s advanced advertising business amplifies our commitment to the MVPD market and accelerates the investments we are making in our advertising business systems portfolio,” said Charlie Vogt, the chief executive of Imagine Communications.
“The advanced advertising management technologies we have acquired from OpenTV add new capabilities to our portfolio and complement our media, playout and networking platforms,” he continued. “The addition of the experienced and talented research, development and services team from OpenTV further expands our world-class engineering and support expertise to create new innovations for this growing market segment.”
Steve Reynolds, the chief technology officer of Imagine Communications said changing viewing habits are making the challenges of managing video advertising campaigns increasingly complex.
“The advanced advertising assets acquired from OpenTV are the result of significant investments in innovation to resolve these challenges for MVPDs by streamlining operations, lowering costs, providing rich analytics, and managing the complexity of working across both traditional and new media environments.”
The OpenTV products will complement the existing offering of Imagine Communications and provide a foundation for future developments.
In March 2014 the former Harris Broadcast was split into two companies, Imagine Communications and Gates Air. Imagine Communications provides media software and video infrastructure for broadcast and multichannel video services. Its products cover media and advertising management, playout and network distribution.