• by Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, December 12, 2016

Beginning in the New Year, Opera Mediaworks will have a new name: AdColony.

The choice is an interesting one, considering that AdColony is the name of a mobile video ad platform that Opera bought back in 2004 for an initial cash payout of $75 million.

Until this past summer, Opera Mediaworks was the mobile ad division of Norway-based Opera Software ASA. The unit has accounted for more than 70% of the company’s revenue in recent years. That share was continuing to climb.

In July, however, the entity that will soon be named AdColony was split off from Opera after several Chinese investors acquired the browser business (and the Opera name) for about $600 million.

Some of the same investors were planning to buy all of Opera’s assets -- including Mediaworks for about $1.2 billion -- but that deal failed to materialize.

The name change will become effective starting in January 2017, and the company will continue to stay independent, with the corporate entity listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange under Opera ASA.

“We are passionate about brand experiences that evoke emotion and drive real outcomes by combining both creativity with the next generation of advertising technologies like data science-driven automation and Artificial Intelligence,” stated Will Kassoy, CEO of the entity soon to be named AdColony.

The rebranding is not expected to affect customers or business partners.

Along with mobile video advertising, the new AdColony will encompass rich media and display advertising, streaming video, Instant-Play video, and all associated technologies and ad formats.