Xandr

Last updated

Xandr, Inc.
FormerlyAT&T Advertising and Analytics (2018)
Type Subsidiary
Industry
Predecessors
  • AT&T AdWorks
  • Turner Advertising
FoundedSeptember 25, 2018;5 years ago (2018-09-25)
Headquarters
New York City, New York
,
U.S.
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
Mike Welch (EVP & GM)
Ben John (CTO) [1]
ProductsCommunity
Xandr Invest
Xandr Monetize
Revenue$2,022 million (2019) [2]
Parent Microsoft
Divisions
  • Xandr Media
  • Xandr Data
Subsidiaries
Website www.xandr.com

Xandr, Inc. (pronounced "Zander") is the advertising and analytics subsidiary of Microsoft, which operates an online platform, Community, for buying and selling consumer-centric digital advertising. [3]

Contents

In December 2021, AT&T announced that they had agreed to sell Xandr (including AppNexus and Clypd) to Microsoft for an undisclosed price. [4] The acquisition was completed in June 2022.

History

Following its June 2018 acquisition of AppNexus, [5] Xandr was formed by AT&T to construct a national TV advertising marketplace.

Xandr was launched, on September 25, 2018, at its inaugural AT&T Relevance Conference, in Santa Barbara, California, and was named after its parent company founder, Alexander Graham Bell. [6] [7]

In June 2019, Xandr rebranded its AppNexus DSP, launching Xandr Invest, to serve as its central ad-buying hub. [8] [9]

On October 18, 2019, Xandr acquired Massachusetts-based Clypd, an audience-based sales platform for television advertising. [10] [11]

On April 30, 2020, it was folded into WarnerMedia. [12]

Rumors and speculation spread in 2020 that AT&T was seeking to sell and offload Xandr, along with DirecTV and Crunchyroll. The reasoning is twofold: first, AT&T took on immense debt to purchase WarnerMedia, and any non-core asset sales would help pay off that debt burden. Secondly, Xandr was inherently compromised by its association with AT&T and HBO Max, as many would-be advertisers were reluctant to use what is essentially a competitor for their ad buys, and as such it might be more lucrative on its own. [13]

On May 17, 2021, it was announced that WarnerMedia would be merged with Discovery, Inc. to form a new publicly traded company known as Warner Bros. Discovery, but that the Xandr business would not be included in the transaction and would remain a division of AT&T. [14] On December 21, 2021, AT&T announced that they had agreed to sell Xandr (including AppNexus and Clypd) to Microsoft for an undisclosed price, subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory reviews. [4]

On June 6, 2022, Microsoft completed the acquisition of Xandr to bolster its advertising and retail media business, for about USD $1 billion. [15]

Leadership

Xandr is led by Mike Welch, [1] after the departure in March 2020 by former GroupM North America CEO Brian Lesser, who was appointed chief executive officer of AT&T advertising and analytics in 2017. [16] Kirk McDonald, who served as interim CEO following Lesser's departure, [17] moved to GroupM, a subsidiary of WPP, in August 2020. [18]

Operations

In May 2019, Xandr launched Community, its new video marketplace [19] that connects advertisers, publishers, and consumer media brands, [20] including AT&T's former WarnerMedia (now Warner Bros. Discovery) platforms: CNN, TNT, TruTV, B/R Live, and Otter Media. Other media on the Community platform includes Vice Media, Hearst Communications, Newsy, Philo, Tubi, and Xumo, [21] [22] Vudu, and Bloomberg. [23]

The fee-transparent, [24] consumer-centric Xandr advertising model combines data, AT&T’s then newly acquired WarnerMedia content, AppNexus, and other proprietary advertising technology, to integrate with AT&T’s consumer network, [6] [7] creating the first personalized advertising of its kind, with different commercials being delivered to different viewers simultaneously. [25]

During its first year, Xandr’s revenue was mainly derived from DirecTV sales. The company has approximately 1800 employees, [26] including 60 in Europe. [20]

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References

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