• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, January 4, 2011

Longtime NBC Universal executive Horst Stipp, who worked on cross-platform and product-placement measurement initiatives recently during a 40-year run at NBC, is joining the Advertising Research Foundation.

Stipp, senior vice president, strategic insights and innovation at NBCU, who holds a Ph.D. in sociology, takes the newly created role of executive vice president, global business strategy at the ARF.

At the think tank, he will focus on the viability of innovative research opportunities for the ARF's international members, which may use different systems than are deployed stateside.

Stipp has written on media research in German and English and makes appearances at conferences in Europe. He stated that in his new role he hopes to "expand the ARF's relevance and impact beyond the U.S."

In a MediaPost interview with Charlene Weisler in 2009, Stipp said NBCU had emphasized a shift from a "plain old-fashioned television exposure currency" to one that involved "cross-media and online measurement." He cited NBCU's launch of a TAMi index during the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which looked to track total reach by aggregating TV viewing, with consumption online, on-mobile and via VOD.

Stipp also told Weisler how NBCU broke ground in the sales process using research from IAG that can track value on product placement to "actually use IAG data as a secondary guarantee for some of our clients."