Digital Advertising Specialist Becomes Key Part of Digital Portfolio of Companies
GroupM, the world’s leading global media investment management operation, announced today that it has agreed to acquire plista, a digital media specialist in Germany.
The announcement was made jointly by Rudiger Wanck, GroupM Global Digital COO and Chief Digital Officer EMEA, and Dr. Dominik Matyka, co-founder and Managing Director of Corporation & Business Development at plista who were supported by Corporate Finance Partners, acting as exclusive financial adviser to plista and its shareholders.
Founded in 2008 and employing about 100 people, plista specializes in innovative solutions for targeted real-time digital advertising and content marketing. The company currently operates in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, working for blue chip clients including Volkswagen, Sony, and Coca-Cola, among others.
“plista is a pioneer when it comes to innovative solutions for targeted digital advertising” Wanck said. The company brings advertisers and publishers together via its data-driven content and advertising platform that perfectly complements other units in GroupM’s digital specialist portfolio. “It is our ambition to develop plista from a multi-market operation into a global player; business in the DACH region will therefore continue as usual.”
With thousands of premium websites using plista’s recommendation and advertising technology delivering billions of ads each month, plista is the leading recommendation and advertising platform in the German-speaking world. plista develops high-quality recommendation technology and uses it to deliver personalized reading recommendations and advertisements on websites and mobile devices.
“All of us at plista look forward to being part of the GroupM family and, by extension, part of WPP” said plista’s Matyka. “This agreement will allow us not only to realize our growth objectives, but more importantly to make substantive and forward-looking contributions to the marketing plans of our and GroupM clients across Europe.”
In addition to the global media agencies Maxus, MEC, MediaCom and Mindshare, GroupM’s global network includes digital specialist services such as Xaxis, Quisma and H-art. The acquisition also marks a further step towards WPP’s declared goal of developing its networks in fast-growth markets and sectors and continues WPP’s strategy of strengthening the Group’s capabilities in digital media.
ABOUT GROUPM
GroupM is the leading global media investment management operation. It serves as the parent company to WPP media agencies including Maxus, MEC, MediaCom, and Mindshare. Our primary purpose is to maximize the performance of WPP’s media communications agencies on behalf of our clients, our stakeholders and our people by operating as a parent and collaborator in performance-enhancing activities such as trading, content creation, sports, digital, finance, proprietary tool development and other business-critical capabilities. The agencies that comprise GroupM are all global operations in their own right with leading market positions. The focus of GroupM is the intelligent application of physical and intellectual scale to benefit trading, innovation, and new communication services, to bring competitive advantage to our clients and our companies.
ABOUT PLISTA
plista is a pioneer when it comes to innovative solutions for targeted digital advertising and content marketing. Starting in 2008 the Berlin-based company brings advertisers and publishers together via its data-driven content and advertising platform. Its specially developed targeting and real-time optimization technology enables plista to control both content and advertising based on the interests of the individual user. By using the plista recommendation and advertising technology, i.e. optimally delivering advertising and content, publishers benefit from prolonged visit durations and additional monetization of their mobile services and websites. The highly specialized plista platform makes it possible for advertiser to display scalable text/image advertisements, interactive proprietary video formats, and native advertising in an extensive network of partner websites. To do this, plista operates its specially developed, innovative advertising formats on exclusive inventory space. plista employs +100 people and operates its services in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
ABOUT CFP
Corporate Finance Partners (www.cfpartners.com) is the leading European advisory company for Mergers & Acquisitions and Private Equity/ Venture Capital Placements in the Tech & Internet sphere. Since foundation in 1998, the company is focused on mid-cap transactions in the sectors Internet, media, telco and technology and has successfully advised on more than 200 transactions. Corporate Finance Partners is headquartered in Frankfurt / Germany and operates globally with international offices throughout Europe, USA and Asia.