PASADENA, Calif.—OpenX Technologies, Inc., a major omnichannel supply-side ad platform, has launched TV+, an initiative that it hopes will unlock the full potential of CTV by combining the most powerful aspects of linear and programmatic buying models.
In launching TV+, OpenX noted that in the current CTV landscape, buyers aren’t able to efficiently buy in biddable media environments due to an over-indexing of intermediaries. Additionally, brands and agencies often pay CTV CPMs without having full transparency into what they’re buying. When non-TV content is categorized as CTV, publishers’ premium content is devalued.
In this first phase of TV+, OpenX said it is working to eliminate all resellers from its CTV inventory pool, ensuring that buyers have more working media and reduced invalid traffic. This move also ensures that publishers get their fair cut of transactions to power the development of high-quality content for consumers.
Additionally, OpenX will today remove all non-TV content, including fireplace apps, gaming, UGC, OTT, and mobile, from its CTV inventory. While OpenX will continue to monetize these types of inventory as online video rather than CTV, this will help properly classify content, providing a clearer value for inventory, and more accurate measurement.
This initial step, will help transform programmatic CTV into a high-quality marketing opportunity that allows publishers to confidently place their premium inventory into biddable environments while giving brands and agencies full transparency into what they’re buying, OpenX said.
Several industry players applauded the initiative. “CTV is a powerful channel for marketers to reach and engage with their audiences,” said Adam Roodman, senior vice president of product strategy and management at Yahoo. ”As this happens, solutions that prioritize control and transparency will enable buyers to lean into their KPIs in biddable CTV environments, helping them further realize the full promise of programmatic CTV.”
“As more marketers choose CTV for incremental reach over linear, there's tremendous value for the ecosystem in scaling reach beyond direct buys," added Ashwin Navin, co-founder and CEO at Samba TV. “Solutions that provide trust and transparency empower data providers to scale audiences in CTV and digital while increasing confidence in biddable environments and optimizing working media.”
OpenX reported that TV+ will allow buyers to unlock direct premium publisher integrations across more than 110 million measurable “glass-on-wall” devices. This access to direct-sourced inventory improves transparency and control, while log-level data delivers visibility into impressions.
The initial phase of TV+ also protects consumers’ interests by ensuring they're getting the premium content they signed up for because premium publishers are able to secure an appropriate price for their inventory and invest resources back into creating premium content.
"The long-term growth of biddable TV advertising requires buyers and sellers to have confidence in marketplace integrity," said Chris Kane, founder of Jounce Media. "OpenX’s TV+ creates these conditions, ensuring media buyers get the quality they expect from their TV investments and ensuring media owners, not supply chain intermediaries, are the beneficiary of those investments."
“I've spent the majority of my career in TV, and ensuring that CTV doesn't repeat the same cycles as digital is imperative to the success of programmatic TV,” said Geoff Wolinetz, senior vice president of publisher and demand platforms at OpenX. ”As we embark on creating the future of CTV, we have the opportunity to make programmatic TV more efficient and effective by ensuring content is fit for purpose, accessed directly, and demand and supply partners have transparency across the value chain. This will positively impact buyer confidence, enabling them to implement key strategies such as incremental reach.”
