• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, May 9, 2007

Thanks to the continued growth of online advertising, aQuantive said its first-quarter profits were up 87%, beating Wall Street expectations.

First-quarter net profit rose to $14.2 million, or 16 cents per share--from $7.6 million, or 10 cents per share, a year ago. Revenue rose 55% to $142.6 million. Analysts had forecast earnings per share of 9 cents on revenue of $122.6 million.

aQuantive has also benefited from Google's planned $3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick. Expected to capture more ad dollars as clients defect from DoubleClick, the digital marketing company raised its second-quarter forecasts from $148 million to $153 million and net income from $13 million to $14.5 million.

For the full year, aQuantive now expects $615 million in and $71 million in net income. Previous forecasts were $595 million and $66 million, respectively.

aQuantive and rivals like 24/7 Real Media have become acquisition targets since the Google/DoubleClick deal was announced.

"aQuantive started 2007 with strong financial performance, resulting in 42% organic revenue growth," said Brian McAndrews, the company's president and CEO. "Our performance in the first quarter builds on the investments and results of 2006. Our focus on innovating, expanding globally and providing differentiated client service to the digital marketing industry is working."

aQuantive's digital marketing services segment had revenue of $83.1 million in the first quarter, compared with $55.2 million in the first quarter of 2006. Operating income was $10.3 million, compared to $6.1 million a year earlier.

aQuantive's digital marketing technologies segment saw revenue of $38.1 million in the first quarter, compared to $27.7 million in the first quarter of 2006. Operating income was $13.9 million, up from $11.1 million in 2006.

During a Tuesday conference call, McAndrews stressed that Google's acquisition of DoubleClick would be a boon to Atlas, aQuantive's ad serving unit, which he claimed was the "only third-party ad serving offering with scale."

McAndrews said that agencies' and marketers' concerns about Google's acquisition of DoubleClick would drive market share to Atlas. Aside from competitive concerns about a Google/DoubleClick combination, MacAndrews expressed "concern about the loss of objectivity" that might occur when DoubleClick is used to measure Google's ad results.

McAndrews said there are no reliable third-party measures for ad-serving market share, but claimed that Atlas has the top market share on the "buy side" [advertisers and agencies] in the U.S. and the U.K., the world's two largest online markets.

He noted that Atlas has gained steam in video-on-demand ad serving as well.

Turning to aQuantive's digital marketing services division--Avenue A|Razorfish, and the recently acquired Duke in France--McAndrews said: "Right now the market is incredibly strong." He added that aQuantive has a challenge in finding the right people to service all of the business.

As a result, said CFO M. Wayne Wisehart, the company has been using a higher than normal number of independent contractors.