The following is an interview with Smart AdServer CEO Cyrille Geffray. He discusses the company’s position in the market, its global presence, the 2016 hiring surge and this year’s revenue ambitions.
INTERVIEWER: What’s Smart AdServer’s current position in the ad tech market?
CYRILLE GEFFRAY: We can now say we’re a key global player in the programmatic advertising marketplace serving ads to 650 million unique visitors per month on 900 million devices, a third of those on mobile.* We’ve seen programmatic advertising grow 342% since Q1 of this year.
In addition to a leadership presence in France as well as Latin America, we’ve established ourselves as one of the top four full-stack players worldwide — and the only European one. We’re the only 100% publisher-focused independent player in the media market. With the help of our investor, Cathay Capital, we have accelerated our global development, particularly in the U.S. and Asia, and have increased our technological lead over the competition.
Would you say Smart AdServer is “going global”?
Absolutely. Historically known as an ad server on the European market, we now have nine offices worldwide in France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Poland, the U.S., Argentina, Brazil and Mexico. We serve 600 clients, including large global media groups such as Genesis Media, Axel Springer, Clarin, Telcel, SFR, Aufeminin, Le Monde, Amaury Médias, Webedia and HiMedia.
Smart AdServer has been a big mobile player since 2010, and currently claims close to 50% of the market in continental Europe. It was the first mobile ad server certified by the U.S. IAB.
How did you clench this leadership position?
The organic integration of our SSP into our pre-existing ad server gives us a unique strategic position in the market, enabling our clients to easily link the ideas of branding and programmatic and to fully optimize publisher revenues.
Clients benefit from a powerful solution that is completely unified at the functional level (video and rich media formats, page exclusivity, etc.) for both direct and programmatic sales.
What are Smart AdServer’s 2016 ambitions?
Smart’s publishing partners will see revenue surge by the end of 2016 as we approach our goal of doubling annual sales revenue to $68 million.
How does Smart AdServer plan to reach its goal?
Having grown by 75% in 2015, we aim to double our current sales revenue by tripling investment in R&D and marketing while expanding globally, particularly in the U.S. and Asia. We will also increase our workforce by 40% before the end of the year, adding 60 employees.
*Figures from Quantcast
