NEW YORK, March 19, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Rakuten
Marketing, the global leader in omni-channel marketing and a
division of Rakuten, Inc., today announced its acquisition of Deep
Forest Media, a programmatic mobile marketing company and
demand-side platform (DSP). The acquisition enables Rakuten
Marketing to introduce a superior mobile advertising platform that
excels in both reach and accuracy through the combination of Deep
Forest's cross-device algorithm and Rakuten Inc.'s rich consumer
data.
Palo-Alto-based Deep Forest
caught the attention of Rakuten Marketing with its ability to
improve mobile performance with its quality and breadth of
proprietary tracking and optimization technology. In addition to
cross-device targeting, Deep Forest's technology empowers
advertisers to personalize mobile campaigns with hyper-local
targeting, user segmentation across devices, and dynamic creative
optimization with a broad reach across leading networks and
exchanges, including MoPub, Rubicon Project and TapSense.
Bringing these mobile capabilities in-house empowers Rakuten
Marketing to better engage consumers across all its channels,
particularly display, where Deep Forest's technology will
strengthen the reach and performance of Rakuten Marketing's dynamic
mobile ad platform.
"Rakuten Marketing has a bold, customer-centric vision for the
future of omni-channel marketing and we could not have found a
better home for our team and technology," said Deep Forest Founder
and CEO, Naghi Prasad. "With the
synergies between our technologies and Rakuten data, we are poised
to have the kind of impact on the market that will change the way
we think about the consumer journey and how to optimize it."
The motivation behind the acquisition aligns with Rakuten
Marketing's commitment to drive the omni-experience, which is about
improving cross-channel performance with marketing built around the
consumer experience. Integral to this vision is data that
accurately reflects consumers' cross-device interactions across all
marketing channels. By integrating Rakuten's deterministic consumer
data with Deep Forest's probabilistic cross-device algorithm,
Rakuten Marketing will offer a new level of precision for
performance and optimization across the marketing funnel,
leveraging a unique understanding of the consumer path to purchase,
across channels and devices.
"With mobile commerce projected to reach $298 billion in 2015 we wanted to invest in a
company and team that bring strong mobile capabilities to align
with our vision," says Tony Zito,
CEO, Rakuten Marketing. "A critical part of that is integrating
cross-device engagement and conversion data into our proprietary
attribution solutions to reinforce and expand our commitment to
performance and transparency."
This acquisition comes on the heels of Rakuten Marketing's
announcement of its proprietary omni-experience attribution tool,
Cadence Essential. The Deep Forest acquisition further reinforces
Rakuten Marketing's commitment to innovation that brings deeper,
actionable insights that are data-driven and accurate, to ensure
its clients are armed with the resources to strengthen their
marketing communications and, ultimately, their relationship with
their customers.
Learn more about Rakuten Marketing at
www.rakutenmarketing.com.
About Rakuten Marketing
Rakuten Marketing is the
global leader in omnichannel marketing, delivering its vision of
driving the omni experience - marketing designed for a
streamlined consumer experience. Offering an integrated strategy
that combines consumer centric insights with e-commerce expertise,
Rakuten Marketing aims to inspire better marketing. Rakuten
Marketing's omnichannel services include Rakuten Affiliate
Network (formerly LinkShare), Rakuten
Display (formerly MediaForge), Rakuten
Attribution (formerly DC Storm), and Rakuten Search.
Operating as a division of Rakuten, Inc. (4755: TOKYO), one of the world's leading Internet
service companies, Rakuten Marketing is headquartered in
New York City, with additional
offices in Australia, Brazil, Japan, the United
Kingdom, and throughout the United
States. Follow us on Twitter or learn more
at http://www.rakutenmarketing.com.
All trademarks contained herein are the property of their
respective owners.
About Deep Forest Media
Founded by online and mobile
advertising veterans from Yahoo, Netflix, Apple, Turn and Tapjoy,
Deep Forest Media created and deployed the world's first
self-learning DSP built specifically for mobile. The company
provides a comprehensive full-stack mobile platform, bringing
together advanced data science and optimization solutions to
brands, agencies and mobile marketers around the world. Based in
Palo Alto, CA, Deep Forest raised
Seed and Series A rounds led by The Hive and March Capital,
respectively.
Jessica Joines
CMO, Rakuten Marketing
646-581-3202
jessica.joines@rakuten.com
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SOURCE Rakuten Marketing