Looking back through the all-too-brief annals of New York tech history, DoubleClick is arguably the city’s most successful exit. The company has always been less-famous for the unsexy business of what it does (dynamic ad serving) than for the fact that Google plunked down a jaw-dropping $3.1 billion for it in 2007. It was the spoils from Doubleclick that enabled Kevin Ryan to go on to launch Gilt Groupe, which begat GroupMe, and so on and so forth. Now, another New York City ad-tech startup is hoping to follow DoubleClick’s lead.
Yesterday DoubleVerify announced that it picked up $33 million from the likes of First Round Capital and JMI Equity. As co-founder Oren Netzer told VentureBeat, “We had half a dozen offers, but JMI was the best choice for a new partner because they know the space so well. We want to be the next DoubleClick and JMI helped DoubleClick grow and eventually be sold to Google for $3.1 billion.”
DoubleVerify, whose total funding is now $46.5 million, is trying to beat out competitors like fellow New York City startup AdSafe or Seattle’s AdXpose in the growing market for ad verification. As the online advertising business booms, publishers, marketers and ad networks are placing increasing importance on keeping track of individual ads. “We can tell you 96 percent of the time where an ad was served. Our closest competitors only have see-through rates between 30 and 70 percent,” Mr. Netzer claims. Working in its favor is the fact that its locked down Fortune 500 customers like American Express, Bank of America, Walmart, Wells Fargo, AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile.
Mr. Netzer’s company also happens to be one of the growing number of hybrid start-ups we told you about with its business arm in New York City and its engineering offices in Tel Aviv. So, it looks like it has that “friendly” Israeli mafia thing going for it as well.
