Ad Tech Team Up: Clever On Demand Acquires AudienceFUEL And Will Use Its Name

Clever On Demand, a company whose technology allows publishers to manage multiple ad networks, has acquired AudienceFUEL, a publisher-to-publisher marketing platform (more on what that means in a second).

The price of the acquisition wasn’t disclosed, but the combined company will do business as AudienceFUEL (which does seem like the better name). Clever On Demand founder and CEO Troy McConnell will serve as CEO, while AudienceFUEL CEO Al Silverstein will be president and chief revenue officer. And as part of the deal, Active International has made an additional investment in AudienceFUEL.

Prior to the acquisition, the two companies were already working together, with Clever On Demand providing its technology services to AudienceFUEL, so naturally they started talking about teaming up more closely.

“It just made complete sense,” Silverstein says. “It really allowed us to find new efficiencies and expand our profile within the marketplace.”

McConnell, who previously founded Hispanic and Latin American-focused media company Batanga and Image Technology, says the two teams are working to integrate their services. Clever On Demand and AudienceFUEL are a good fit, he says, because both products help publishers make money from ad inventory that they don’t sell directly — Clever On Demand by filling inventory with ads from multiple networks, AudienceFUEL by allowing publishers to exchange inventory with each other (as illustrated in the diagram below).

audiencefuel diagram