• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, June 23, 2011

Collective and Microsoft-backed AppNexus have teamed up to create an ad exchange module and media management platform for publishers. AMP Exchange now gives publishers the ability to create private exchanges using real-time bidding without separately managing reserved inventory.

Under development for nearly a year, AMP Exchange was built to serve brand publishers and premium networks, such as IDG TechNetwork. Through the platform, publishers can now control audiences and inventory packages. It integrates with the publisher's ad server, enabling direct-sold and exchange-sold campaigns to compete for specific impressions based on both CPM and other buy-side and sell-side metrics.

The platform completes the process without changing ad servers or shifting impressions to a third-party yield optimizer or ad exchange, explains Collective CEO Joe Apprendi. This allows publishers to maximize revenue across their inventory and provides a unified view of revenue opportunities and results.

Allowing publishers to see the demand for ad impressions -- not just for ad exchanges -- gives them the ability to accept or reject the bid at the best price.

As a result of gaining the best price, more ad impressions become available through RTB, giving advertisers greater access to desired audiences. The platform also gives sellers immediate access to all RTB buyers from agency trading desks to ad networks.

Collective used AMP Exchange to launch the Collective Exchange in late 2010; it became a natural next step for Collective to build out sell-side platform capabilities and include ad-exchange functions. The company quietly made improvements to ensure that it met the "private exchange 2.0" business requirements before rolling it out.

There are other platforms from companies such as AdMeld and OpenX that support the ability to build private exchanges, but Apprendi boils it down to a few core differences.

"Existing private exchange systems have been about monetizing remnant inventory," Apprendi said. "We believe the conversation needs to change to maximizing revenue on all impressions, not just the ones that are left over."

For publishers, maximizing revenue on all impressions means having a choice of whether to allow a $6 bid on a private exchange that might compete with the $3 ad sold directly, Apprendi said. This enables publishers to squeeze the most from each ad impression, yet remain flexible enough to serve the "guaranteed deals."

Collective clients running on the AMP Data & Media Management Platform clients, as well as on the DoubleClick ad-serving platform, can tap into the module. Integration with several other publisher ad servers will follow later this year.