Adthink Media : reveals its 3-years growth ambitions

Press release

Tassin-la-Demi-Lune, October 13, 2017

ADTHINK REVEALS ITS 3-YEAR GROWTH AMBITIONS ADTHINK (ALADM) plans to capitalise on its strong business model as a pure player in performance-based advertising.

Refocusing its service offers on the issues facing advertisers, using a mix of proprietary and non- proprietary technologies and enacting an international expansion strategy should enable the company to grow by 25% annually to exceed 45 million euros in turnover by 2020.

1. The starting point: the needs of advertisers

   Within a digital advertising market expected to see annual growth of at least 10% through 2020, advertisers are facing three major issues:

   • ROI demands: The Internet is now 20 years old. Advertisers have grown more mature in terms of their digital advertising spending. And even though new "frontiers" emerge on a regular basis (video today), measuring ROI is systematised within Marketing departments, a task that is facilitated by tracking tools. In addition to these measurements, they must ensure a positive ROI.
   • Complexity of expertise: regulatory context, web user tolerance (adblockers), automating processes (header bidding), programmatic advertising, RTB, audience trading, data analysis, the role of the Facebook/Google duopoly, etc. The business of digital advertising is in a state of permanent disruption, while acquisition techniques draw on increasingly sophisticated skills and tools.
   • Internationalisation: the growth drivers available to a majority of French and European advertisers lie beyond the boundaries of their home countries. They will need to direct their advertising investments towards these new markets, with the aim of setting up powerful local marketing systems, while maintaining control of their publication and messaging.
2. Adthink's response: a rare mix of people and technology

   As a leading player in the performance-based advertising market since 2001, Adthink has rolled out a broad palette of unique skills in this business, embodied today by a team of nearly 50 professionals speaking 10 languages and with an average age of 33, as well as a full portfolio of advanced technologies and a keen understanding of Adtech technologies available on the market.

   The company now offers 5 solutions to advertisers:

   • Affiliate Network: launched in 2015 from the United States to anticipate changes in the market, Adthink's Affiliate Network is emerging as a leader in the landscape of affiliation platforms. It uses an external technology that is highly robust and configurable. Adthink tested and implemented a unique organisation relying on a team of independent traders, called Associates, who stimulate the Network's performance with a 100% flexible cost structure. 75% of the Networks' clients are international.
   • Display network: Adthink developed proprietary technology, called AdAccess, adapted to new advertising formats (native advertising, mobile, video) and 100% RTB. The platform delivers more than one billion impressions every month, by using its connections with many Publisher sites, and is already highly internationalised with 50% of its traffic sourced outside France. On the Publisher side, it offers an e-cpm that performs above average.
   • Trading Desk: Adthink has compiled expertise in programmatic buying (notably via a strong mastery of algorithms) enabling it to operate on DSPs worldwide and to respond to all the briefs of the most demanding international advertisers in terms of targeting and advertising power.
   • Customer Acquisition: Adthink possesses a marketing intelligence unit that designs and implements traffic activation systems to boost the performance of campaigns. Adthink has notably built up a thorough knowledge of tools for capturing and qualifying leads.
   • Data Activation: positioned in the data market from an early stage with the creation of the first data marketplace (BIG), Adthink enables advertisers to capitalise on data (proprietary/non-proprietary) to position their messages "in the right place at the right time". Adthink has notably developed an innovative e-mail targeting offer that can identify new leads outside of advertiser databases and send pinpointed advertising messages directly to the inbox.

     Adthink offers a full palette of business solutions-strong drivers of advertising performance-that are tested, proven and able to be mobilised independently or collectively depending on the objectives of each advertiser, from very small businesses to multinationals: visibility, leads, conversion. With its position as an expert, Adthink is not setting itself up as a competitor to giants like Google and Facebook, but rather as a partner to advertisers in their quest for performance among these audiences.

3. Scalable development

   Once again focused on its original business as a pure player in performance-based advertising, after announcing the transfer of its Publishing activities, Adthink will benefit from a clear position with respect to advertisers, which it intends to promote actively.

   Over the next three years, its efforts will focus on:

   • Commercial development, in France and abroad, with a strengthened Sales House working across departments and capable of offering its 5 solutions. Adthink's international growth will rely on the rapid deployment of its Affiliate Network, with an initial goal of expanding its positions in Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and Eastern Europe.
   • Technology: the company will continue to upgrade its private marketplace and Data Activation tools. As in the case of its Affiliate Network, Adthink prefers to utilise and assemble technologies available on the market, so it can concentrate on investments that generate real value.

   Adthink intends to protect the profitability of its operations by coordinating these developments through a modular structure of low costs, based on a strong corporate platform and an ecosystem of partners and independent experts that it can call upon in a flexible way. This development method is made possible by new labour models that make it possible to enlist specific skills at the best cost and across multiple time zones.

   The recent and upcoming transfers of the company's Publishing activities will boost its self-financing capacity. The company may also consider raising new equity, notably in preparation for a potential major external growth operation that would accelerate its development.

4. A new identity to represent this new vision Smart Performance Advertising:

This slogan, a promise of efficiency and expertise, embodies the strength of its business model as a pure player in performance-based advertising. It comes along with a sleek and angular new logo. The "hyperlink" blue colour refers back to its business as a driver of digital conversion. The deconstructed but still comprehensible lettering draws on the company's capacity for interpretation and imagination, which form the bases of all advertising messages.

Adthink is unveiling its new website today: www.adthink.com. The new identity will be in use across all the company's communication tools.

About Adthink

Adthink supports advertisers in online lead and customer acquisition through a full range of performance-based advertising solutions: Affiliate Network, Display Network, Trading Desk, Client Acquisition, Data Activation. Created in 2001, Adthink is present in Lyon (head office), Paris, Geneva and Palo Alto. It earned a turnover of 25.6 million euros in 2016.

Adthink is listed on the Euronext Growth market of the Paris stock exchange (ALADM - FR0010457531). Adthink was certified as an "Innovative Business" by OSEO Innovation and is eligible for FCPI investment funds.

Learn more at: www.adthink.com

Contact: Ségolène de Saint-Martin - Tel.: [phone] - [e-mail]