Ad tech provider MediaMath is forging strongly into programmatic video and connected TV, by among other things joining the board of the IAB Digital Video Center of Excellence, and seeking to help drive transparency and industry standards.  

Mike Fisher, MediaMath’s Head of Video and Advanced TV said, “We couldn’t be more delighted to have a voice in the important conversation around the challenges that come with automated TV inventory, and the opportunity to shape best practices for transacting in the programmatic TV space.”

MediaMath is helping facilitate the shift of TV ad dollars to OTT by enabling its agency and advertiser partners with the ability to buy inventory in its Curated Market for TV. The market includes select inventory from Sling TV, AT&T/DirecTV Now, Discovery, Fox and others. MediaMath is emphasizing personalization through audience data sets, attribution by tying CTV ads to an omnichannel device graph and campaigns across TV networks.

MediaMath joins many others in the industry who have similarly prioritized connected TV and programmatic (data-enabled and automated) transactions as critical to TV advertising’s future.

Several key trends have accelerated in the past year that are critical to the market’s transition: the proliferation of CTV devices, now estimated to be in over two-thirds of U.S. homes, the launch of numerous ad-supported premium video apps and the ongoing shift of viewers from traditional pay-TV bundles to “skinny bundles.” The latter provides a potentially vast new source of linear and on-demand OTT viewership whose inventory can be sold using digital tactics.

With all of these sure to gain further momentum, all ecosystem players are going to be accelerating their efforts around CTV and programmatic TV.