NEW YORK—As part of a push to expand its advanced advertising capabilities, Discovery will become a minority owner of OpenAP, an advanced advertising company.
Discovery joins Fox, NBCUniversal and ViacomCBS in the joint venture.
The investment signals an expansion of Discovery’s existing relationship with OpenAP. Discovery integrated with the central TV identity spine, OpenID, in April 2021 and more recently partnered with OpenAP on the launch of XPm, the TV publisher backed cross-platform measurement framework.
The investment in OpenAP is part of Discovery’s strategy of building a technical framework that will allow it to improve its cross-platform audience-based buying capabilities and support alternative currency standards, the company said.
Discovery will join OpenAP’s board of directors with Jon Steinlauf, chief U.S. advertising sales officer, and Jim Keller, executive vice president, digital ad sales and advanced advertising, both representing the company.
“Discovery is excited to take an active role shaping the future of advanced audience buying,” said Keller. “Given our current momentum, influence and growth of audience-based sales, we believe Discovery can help further the work OpenAP has been doing to initiate meaningful change in the market.”
Discovery’s investment follows a year of significant platform growth for OpenAP with half a billion in publisher-driven advertising sales expected to run through OpenAP in fiscal year 2022, marking 140% year-over-year growth, the companies said.
Currently, OpenAP works with more than 100 advertisers following the 2019 launch of the OpenAP Market with centralized advanced audiences able to be distributed to all national TV publishers regardless of platform.
“Discovery has long been a pioneer of TV entertainment with its iconic portfolio of content and direct-to-consumer experiences people love. The last two years have demonstrated the force of change that can happen when we take an audience-first approach to reimagining TV advertising for media owners, advertisers and consumers alike,” said David Levy, CEO of OpenAP. “We are grateful for the increased commitment Discovery is making to work alongside us on this journey of propelling further growth of the marketplace.”
For more information, visit www.openap.tv.
