Synamedia Iris aims to provide an addressable advertising solution for television service providers and broadcasters as well as online services to reach specific viewer segments across all services, devices and screens, unlock new revenue streams. The platform draws on experience gained in developing the AdSmart technology used by Sky and Comcast.
Synamedia, formerly the video platform business of Cisco, partly acquired from the NDS business previously owned by News Corporation, claims to have the most complete, secure and advanced end-to-end open video delivery solution. It is now backed by Permira private equity and Sky, now a Comcast company. The company counts over 200 leading satellite, cable, telco and online operators, broadcasters and media companies among its customers.
NDS worked with Sky on the development of the AdSmart platform, the most sophisticated addressable television advertising system in the world. Comcast has been promoting the AdSmart platform in the United States, notably through its media business, NBCUniversal.
The Iris solution from Synamedia aims to provide a single platform that supports unified campaign management, delivery, and measurement to multiple screens across apps and live, linear and catch-up services. It claims to simplify the execution for service providers and broadcasters, helping them to merchandise their inventory more efficiently while also minimizing operational costs and boosting income.
Using data from multiple sources, Iris enables sophisticated audience insights and anonymized household, user and device-level profiles that can be checked against an advertiser’s desired characteristics.
Combining the most effective advertising screen available with the precision of digital campaigns, Iris provides cross-platform ad measurement to exploit all forms of video inventory in a single campaign. Advertisers can reach their target audiences cost-effectively, while consumers enjoy a more relevant viewing experience, and service providers and broadcasters boost income.
“With Iris, the TV industry can finally combat the erosion of ad revenues to digital platforms and achieve its long-held ambition of generating new income from advanced TV advertising,” said Scott Kewley, who is responsible for advanced advertising and data at Synamedia.
“Our end-to-end solution with its unified campaign management capability makes it easy for customers to drive new revenues from their inventory — even over more challenging one-way and hybrid networks — and offer established and new advertisers an alternative to the increasingly wild west world of online advertising,”