• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, August 10, 2015

The country’s largest cinema advertising network saw total revenues jump 22% from $100 million in the second quarter of 2014 to a record $122 million in the second quarter of 2015, reflecting increased commitments from last year’s upfront and growth in video market share, according to CEO Kurt Hall.

For the first half of the year, total revenues increased 17% from $170 million to $198 million.

NCM benefited from a big spring-summer box-office season, with hits including “The Fast and the Furious 7,” “Avengers: Age of Ultron,” Mad Max: Fury Road,” “Jurassic World” and “Inside Out,” among others. Despite some recent box-office disappointments, including the very lackluster reception for “The Fantastic Four” reboot last weekend, the momentum continued in the third quarter with “Magic Mike XXL,” “Minions,” and “Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation.”

Studios have also scheduled a number of highly anticipated releases for the fall and winter that should keep seats filled, among them “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2,” "Star Wars: The Force Awakens," and the latest James Bond movie, “Spectre.”

NCM is projecting revenue growth of 8%-13% for the third quarter of the year to a range of $109 million to $114 million, and predicts that full-year revenues will increase 8%-10% to a range from $425 million in 2014 to $433 million in 2015.

To date this year, the company has added 33 new national advertising clients in 19 categories, according to Hall.

Looking further ahead, Hall said he expects a number of new initiatives introduced in recent months to help fuel continued future growth for NCM. These include its new audience-targeting tool, called the Cinema Audience Targeting Optimizer or CATO. The tool will allow cinema advertisers to create media schedules based on movie genres that deliver specific audiences -- selected, for example, on the basis of age and gender. NCM expects CATO to be available for all its cinema ad inventory in 2016.

A separate product, Cinema Accelerator, powered by Rocket Fuel’s Audience Accelerator, allows NCM advertisers to target audience members beyond the big screen with mobile and online messages. Cinema Accelerator uses movie ticket purchase data, geolocation and audience modeling to increase recall and frequency with additional activations.

Hall also revealed his plans to retire after ten years leading NCM, which he helped launch in 2005 with its three founding corporate members, AMC, Cinemark and Regal, and then steered through its IPO in 2007. Hall will retire as soon as the company’s board of directors has selected a new CEO and will then continue serving as a consultant advising the board and his replacement for two years after his formal retirement.