In this weekly segment, ExchangeWire sums up key industry updates on ad tech from around the Asia Pacific region – in this edition: Dentsu Aegis Network takes majority stake in Ugam; New biometric study shows a halo effect for ads; Triton Digital Wins The Wires APAC 2019 Best New Product or Service – Sell Side.

Dentsu Aegis Network takes majority stake in Ugam

Dentsu Aegis Network has acquired a majority stake in India-based Ugam, a leading next-generation data and analytics company serving both business-to-business and business-to-consumer enterprises. Ugam will join Merkle, the data-driven, technology-enabled, global performance marketing agency and part of Dentsu Aegis Network. With more than 1,800 employees in India, the United States, and Australia, Ugam represents one of the largest transactions in Merkle’s history.

The business will now become Ugam, a Merkle Company, led by Sunil Mirani, co-founder and chief executive officer, reporting to Craig Dempster, president, Merkle Americas. Reporting structures for the rest of the management team of Ugam will remain unchanged, as they and the rest of the senior leaders will play a key role in the growth plans of the company.

Craig Dempster, president, Merkle Americas, said, “With its experienced management team, highly-educated workforce, scale, and vertical market expertise, Ugam will bring high-end analytics capabilities, along with a broad spectrum of analytical decision support. Their focus on the U.S. market and Fortune 500 companies will create many synergies and strengthen our existing relationships, opening opportunities for each of our client portfolios.”

New biometric study shows a halo effect for ads

Since the inception of digital advertising, marketers have debated the impact of an ad’s environment on how that ad is perceived by its intended audience. The latest biometric research released by Integral Ad Science (IAS) today shows neurological evidence that an ad's environment has a dramatic impact on how people react to the ad. The research found that ads viewed in high-quality mobile web environments were perceived 74% more favourably than the same advertisements seen in low-quality environments.

The study’s findings put measurable neurological results behind the idea that mobile ad effectiveness directly ties to display environment, potentially putting the age-old debate to rest. The biometric study looked at the brain centres responsible for positive and negative affinity and found that consumers liked ad creative more when seen next to high-quality content and actively disliked ads when they appeared next to lower quality content (as determined by IAS proprietary risk scoring). The study indicated that consumers are three times less willing to associate with brands that run alongside unsavoury content.

“This biometric research demonstrates that the quality of an ad’s environment has a dramatic impact on how people react to that ad” said Tony Marlow, CMO at IAS. “People respond to the entire context of an ad impression rather than just a single component of it, and this generates a very strong and positive halo effect for ads that are seen in high-quality environments.”

Triton Digital wqins The Wires APAC 2019 Best New Product or Service – Sell Side

Triton Digital, a global technology and services leader to the digital audio and podcast industry, announced today that they have been named the winner of ExchangeWire’s The Wires APAC 2019 Best New Product or Service – Sell Side for their supply-side platform, Yield-Op.

The Wires APAC recognises the best use of ad tech across all aspects of media sales and buying within the Asia-Pacific region including East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, Australia, and New Zealand, and accepted submissions for the award from the likes of various ad tech vendors, marketing automation providers, media buying agencies, trading desks, agency trading desks, advertisers, and publishers.

“We are honoured to have been selected as this year’s winner,” said Benjamin Masse, Managing Director Market Development & Strategy, Triton Digital, “Where creating innovative products that enable audio publishers to empower and fuel their digital audio and podcast monetisation strategies is our top priority, receiving recognition for a product that does just that motivates us to continue creating solutions that grow the global industry that much more.”