In the budding world of mobile advertising, whoever can control the app developers and gain access to the ad inventory on their apps will eventually win the game. Keep that in mind as you try to understand the very strange acquisition of AdWhirl by AdMob.
You see, AdMob is perhaps the largest independent mobile ad network and AdWhirl is a fast growing mobile ad exchange which allows mobile app developers to switch from AdMob to other competing mobile ad networks such as Quattro, VideoEgg, or Mobclix. Although it launched only last April, AdWhirl was quickly becoming the preferred advertising interface for many developers because they could still serve AdMob ads through it, but not be tied to AdMob if a better deal came along.
AdMob didn’t really like this so it threatened to stop supporting AdWhirl’s “mediation layer” and basically pull out of it altogether. That plan didn’t go over too well with the app developers AdMob needs to keep happy, so it quickly reversed itself and decided to delay its decision to withdraw from AdWhirl. Since it couldn’t take its toys and go home, it did the next best thing. It bought AdWhirl. Problem solved.
Except that now, who is going to trust AdMob to maintain AdWhirl as a neutral exchange rather than use it to funnel more of its own ads to developers? Or worse, to track all of the ad impression data of its competitors to improve its own ad products?
Our source who told us about the acquisition claims that AdWhirl has already been giving AdMob this data on the sly in the hopes that it would be acquired. He also claims that ” there is a lot of stuff under the covers to favor AdMob: in the code, in the data, and biased ad calls to AdMob.” The source, who thinks developers will get the short end of the stick in this deal, also seems to think that AdMob will eventually just shut AdWhirl down, blaming the other ad networks for a lack of cooperation or technical integration issues. We’ll see how that plays out.
But for now, AdWhirl still generates too many impressions for the other ad networks to simply abandon it. But that is exactly what they should do if they want to counter the combined power of Admob and AdWhirl. “I don’t understand how it remains unbiased or why other networks would want to be a part of that,” says Mobclix co-founder Sunil Verma, who has built a competing mobile ad exchange.
AdMob is trying to calm fears of bias by promising to open-source the underlying code which powers AdWhirl. But again, it is not so much the code, as how it is used that is the issue. “No matter what, AdMob will still have access to the data and it will become biased as to who gets the first ad call,” worries Mobclix’s other co-founder Krishna Subramanian. If other mobile ad networks and developers share those concerns, AdMob will have a bigger problem than it did with AdWhirl. It will lose the trust of the developers it needs to survive.
Update: AdMob CEO Omar Hamoui has given us the following response regarding the acquisition:
Our open source solution will be both for the client and the server. We anticipate there will be many independent servers run by developers, and possibly our competitors as well. Once we release the code into the community, we think it will be adopted widely.
Most developers use mediation layers for percentage based inventory allocation. This is not something that you can game or manipulate. The mediation component either fulfills the percentage allocation or not. We are committed to making this solution as open as it needs to be to make everybody comfortable. We also expect the market will hold us accountable to this course of action.
The AdWhirl team has visited our offices over the past several days as we have worked through this deal. However any claims that we have historically been sharing data with AdWhirl or manipulating how it works for our benefit is completely false.
Since the news broke we’ve been talking to developers and they agree that the key is an open and transparent solution. We expect to be held to that.
What is the word mob anyway? AdMob, Mobclix? why?
what about mob for mobile?
OHHH ok. wow, totally didn’t see that
stands for “mobile”
In UK cell phones are called mobiles.
well if i had the data i would peek at it too. its only logical that they would peek at the data of a company they just bought. the reason they bought adwhirl was probably to end the competition
this is just massed up!
As a long-time user of AdWhirl this was also my first reaction to the news. While AdMob can easily open source the client side code, the same can not be done for the server side code – where most of the value of AdWhirl lies.
If the server side code is provided as a hosted solution by AdMob, then there is no getting around the conflict of interest. Even if the code is available to view developers have no way of auditing what is actually deployed.
The other option is that the code will be available to developers to host themselves. This creates a lot more work for developers thus removing a lot of the current benefits of AdWhirl.
If you can’t beat them, simply buy them out…!
AdWhirl team are sellouts! They just killed the neutrality of their platform for a few bucks and screwed the developers.
One great alternative here is Tapjoy (www.tapjoy.com); I’m surprised they aren’t mentioned in this article since they are AdWhirl’s largest competitor. We’ve been using them for weeks and are very happy with the way their system chooses the highest paying ads in real time.
Isn’t mobclix AdWhirl’s largest competitor?
Well, I personally wouldn’t buy the hype about Mobclix. I would say the best competitor to AdWhirl would be TapJoy.
I have been working with Mobclix and they have been giving me great eCPMs partially because they have waaaaaay more ad networks than Tapjoy. Mobclix has been great to work with and provided me awesome support. Mobclix is now over 30 people whereas tapjoy is still on 2 people…
I would not agree. Mobclix has been giving pretty low eCPM and is probably due to them being so new. Also integration has been a pain.
There is no way admob would leave this neutral! Why would they pay to host an open solution. Let’s not forget – isn’t admob the one that rejected mediation? and this open source stuff – not gonna work – which network would trust them and use it?
who cares.
So if I’m reading Omar Hamoui’s comment right then mediation with AdWhirl’s server side solution will:
A) Be extremely fragmented.
B) Not select the best paying advertisements real time like Mobclix or Tapjoy.
C1) Be less accountable OR
C2) Require more work to maintain.
Time to switch.
Anyone know whether Mobclix or Tapjoy is better? I’m leaning towards the former since their library is smaller and they are connected to more ad networks.
I would say that TapJoy is better, because the Mobclix staff can be extremely difficult to contact, so there is poor customer support, and the system is very inelegant, especially reporting. OTOH, TapJoy has excellent reporting, 24/7 live customer support, and features that no other competitor has such as the ability to provide offers and integrate with virtual currencies. I am in the process of migrating all my apps to TapJoy, and so far it is going well.
Michael, not sure what the basis is for the above comment. I’ve been using mobclix for several months and actually switched from Adwhirl to Mobclix because the Mobclix solution is more elegant. Technically, Tapjoy has the same problems as Adwhirl… Tapjoy/adwhirl libraries are HUGE because of client side solution, both of them have broken reporting because they only estimate (through their own click and impressions tracking) what runs through the system… mobclix gives me transparency to all ad networks to be managed and provides more accurate reporting because the numbers actually come from the networks… not to mention is a server side solution with optimized architecture… i think the ad networks like that which is why they have so many more partners that tapjoy… you should seriously compare the two and i sure you will choose mobclix as i did…
Hi Neal,
Great hearing from you. It’s always nice to get a different perspective/opinion. Just as a follow-up if you’re ever reading this could you send me an email of a screenshot of MobClix actually being used to optimize your ad networks? Such as a screen showing what impressions are coming from what network, etc. You can send to michael[at] thetalogik.com. Thanks.
Hey Michael, work for TapJoy much?
i cant wait until adsense for android comes out of beta….
Not much different than what Google is trying to do with AdSense.
http://www.tech...hey-approve-of/
Will anyone trust Google? They mostly will not, but do not feel like they have a choice or it will just be the easiest path to take.
What’s the possibly best way to beat your closest competitor?
Simply buy them out and then shut them down.
Im gonna answer the headline with a simple “nup”! But I dont trust any ad networks……
I was concerned at first but if they are going to open source this then it won’t be an issue in my opinion.