Teads expands partnership with Vidaa USA
Media platform Teads is expanding its advertising offering by partnering with Vidaa USA, the operating system for smart TVs used by manufacturers such as Hisense, Toshiba, Scheider, Loewe and Leica.
Under the partnership, Teads customers will have access to ad placements on CTV’s home screen and Vidaa Channels, a free live and on-demand TV service. The partnership covers the U.S., Canada and 27 markets in Europe and Asia Pacific.
According to Teads, the collaboration strengthens the company’s TV advertising capabilities, which in turn supports its mission to provide brands with consistent, high-quality advertising experiences across all screens. It also builds on past CTV inventory partnerships between the two companies.
Teads platform allows partners to leverage buy-side, sell-side, creative, data and AI optimization technologies. It offers a single point of access to purchase inventory from publishers and content providers. Teads also works with measurement companies, including Comscore and LiveRamp, to offer brands and advertisers audience targeting and engagement capabilities. Meanwhile, Vidaa functions as a smart TV platform with more than two billion hours of content each month across leading content providers. The app includes access to aps such as Netflix, Disney+, Apple TV+, Max, Prime Video, Paramount+, YouTube and FuboTV.
Netflix adds former YouTube head to its Canadian team
Netflix has hired Lindsay Doyle to lead its public policy work in Canada. Doyle joins as its Ottawa-based director of public policy for Canada, reporting to Ruchi Bhowmik, VP, public policy for the U.S. and Canada.
Prior to joining Netflix, Doyle was head of government affairs and public policy for YouTube in Canada, which she was promoted to in May. She first joined Google Canada’s policy team in 2018, focusing on content policy, trade, AI and taxation, and worked closely with the company’s philanthropic arm Google.org.
She sits on the boards of the Canadian American Business Council and MediaSmarts, in addition to serving on the advisory board of the Master of Public Policy Program at McMaster University.
The director of public policy role was previously held by Stéphane Cardin, who departed the company on July 5. Bhowmik held the position on an interim basis while Netflix searched for a new Canadian policy lead.
The appointment comes at a critical juncture for Netflix as the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) continues its modernization process for the broadcasting sector. The CRTC set base contribution requirements for foreign-owned streamers in June, and opened public consultations on Canadian programming (including the definition of Canadian content) last month.
OpenAI could be bringing ads to ChatGPT
OpenAI is considering entering the advertising market by including ads in its AI products, according to the Financial Times. Sarah Friar, OpenAI’s chief financial officer, told the newspaper that the company was evaluating an ad model, adding that they planned to be “thoughtful about when and where we implement them.”
The creator of ChatGPT has intensified its efforts to generate revenue from its AI-based search engine. In addition to subscriptions, its other sources of revenue comes from access to its app programming interface (API), which allows companies and developers to build on its technology, as well as from the sale of individual and enterprise licenses of ChatGPT.
According to OpenAI, its revenue has grown to $4 billion annually thanks to the huge success of ChatGPT. The chatbot, which was launched two years ago, has grown to more than 250 million weekly active users. However, the high costs of training new AI models could mean large sums of money for OpenAI and the support of investors would not be enough to cover the expenses.
Other large technology companies, including Google and Meta, have adopted advertising to monetize their online audiences. AI-powered answer engines are also turning to it to boost their businesses, such as Perplexity, which has been testing it since November.
With files from Kelly Townsend
