Mobile ad network InMobi on Thursday announced that it has launched a programmatic exchange for mobile advertising, dubbed the InMobi Exchange. InMobi has tapped Rubicon Project to power the new exchange.
The InMobi Exchange will have a focus on native advertising, making it the second native-focused mobile ad exchange to launch this week. (NativeX launched an exchange of its own on Wednesday.)
“Demand for native ads is increasing, as their high performance makes them very attractive to advertisers,” stated Jide Sobo, head of mobile at MEC UK. He added, however, that “lack of scale is one of the primary reasons native ads are not as popular as they could be.”
InMobi believes its exchange is capable of helping advertisers clear that “scale” hurdle. The company claims that more than 759 million monthly unique users from across the globe will be reachable through the exchange across 30,000 mobile apps, making it one of the largest in the world.
Buyers using the exchange will have access to InMobi’s audience segment data, giving them additional data to work with when running mobile campaigns. On the sell-side, publishers and app developers can use real-time bidding (RTB) to sell either native ads or traditional mobile formats. The InMobi Exchange supports the IAB’s OpenRTB initiative meant to standardize native programmatic buying.
“[W]e are taking the next natural step by bringing these custom native experiences to programmatic buyers and sellers at
scale,” stated Naveen Tewari, CEO of InMobi. “We believe that this represents the next era of digital media buying globally.”
Tewari talks more about the new exchange in
the video below:
InMobi was smart to jump on this. They've lost their lead among the top innovators in mobile advertising. Airpush and Millennial Media are way ahead, and more effective. As a developer, I don't make as much with InMobi as I used to... hopefully this is the start of a turnaround for them.