Mobile ad network madvertise puts down roots in UK, Spain and Italy

Steve O'Hear

Steve O’Hear is probably best known as a technology journalist, currently at TechCrunch where he focuses mainly on European startups, companies and products. He was previously co-founder and CEO of expertise platform Beepl where he helped the company navigate its first VC round, along with seeing the product through development, private alpha and a high profile public launch. In November... → Learn More

Tuesday, April 5th, 2011

Mobile ad network madvertise is continuing its European expansion, opening dedicated offices in London, Barcelona, Madrid and Milan.

That’s because the Berlin-headquartered startup is seeing 35% of its revenues coming from international campaigns, coupled with the fact that ad sales, even online, need a certain amount of actual feet on the ground. This is especially true if you’re targeting major international brands, which in the case of madvertise include Google, Ford and Footlocker. Madvertise offers customers like these “expert consulting advice” and help with media planning, even though its product includes a self-service platform to manage campaigns.

The long term goal, says Eric Urdahl, Chief Sales Officer at madvertise, is to become “the leading network for mobile advertising in Europe.” The company already has offices in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, and plans to expand other European destinations in the coming year.

None of this should be that surprising, however. Back in March of last year, madvertise closed a series A round from Earlybird Venture Capital and the startup’s previous investor and co-founder Team Europe Ventures. The amount wasn’t disclosed but was described as in the “medium single-digit million Euros” range and was to be used specifically to leverage its strong position in the mobile advertising market in German-speaking countries (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) and for further international expansion. What we’re seeing today is that plan coming to fruition.

Madvertise offers advertisers a mobile ad marketplace with a range of targeting options including by demographic, content topics, defined handset models, operating systems, time, geographic location, and frequency capping.

For mobile app developers there’s the opportunity to monetize their apps through advertising, obviously, but perhaps controversially, madvertise also offers its KatAPPult service which claims to guarantee app developers a top 25 position in their respective app store category.