Rubicon Project Eliminates Buy-Side Fees To Kick Up Business

Ad-tech company Rubicon Project continues to have problems -- and is looking to make changes.

Just about a week ago, its stock fell some 40% due to sharply declining revenues in its third-quarter reporting period, with a drop from $65.8 million for the period the year before to $35.2 million.

The company posted a massive net loss of $103.6 million versus net income the year before of $3.5 million.

To push for higher revenue results, the company said it would eliminate “buy” side transaction fees for its advertising platform. Total advertising spend through its platform dropped in the third quarter to 20% to $195 million from $242.8 million.

Rubicon’s stock price on Friday was still down at $1.97 versus its November 2 close of $3.45. Back in March, its stock was priced at $8.39. In April 2016, its stock was at $20.18.

Earlier this year, Rubicon was looking for a possible sale deal, according to a report. Over the last year, Rubicon has been focused on mobile and video ad platforms, but was late to the game on header bidding, the technology that enables publishers to obtain competitive pricing on ad inventory.

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Recently, Rubicon inked an arrangement with Google in which deals from Rubicon Project’s Private Marketplace are now integrated into Google’s DoubleClick Bid Manager -- which it says makes it the first third-party exchange to offer private marketplace deals through Bid Manager.

The deal allows advertisers to transact private marketplace deals from numerous media-buying systems without logging into Rubicon's media-buying platform.

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