MoPub, a mobile advertising startup founded by ex-AdMob and Google employees, is launching support for in-game ads and is also announcing a deal to power advertising in DeNa-owned ngmoco’s Mobage gaming network.
MoPub, which is backed by Accel Partners and others, develops a self-serve ad serving platform for mobile applications and websites that allows mobile publishers to serve direct-sold rich media banner and interstitial ads in addition to optimizing their remnant inventory with networks like AdMob, Jumptap, and Millennial Media. It is essentially a DoubleClick for mobile ads.
MoPub also recently launched an ad marketplace, which is a virtual trading floor for mobile ads, allowing app publishers to connect with ad buyers in real-time. The startup says it has already experienced 30 percent week-over-week growth in ad dollars on its platform since the launch.
Today, MoPub is announced compatibility with game development platform Unity 3D, making the startup one of the first ad servers to support games developed using the popular video game tool.
MoPub has also added support for MRAID and ORMMA rich media standards, which allows publishers to include expansion ads and HTML5 animation more efficiently through the MoPub platform.
Through the Ngmoco deal, MoPub will be powering all direct sold brand campaigns and Marketplace real-time bidding campaigns, as well as contributing significantly to the facilitation of ad network demand on ngmoco’s new Mobage gaming platform. Game developers Neon Play, Animoca, Miniclip, Fluik, and Com2Us are also using MoPub’s mobile ad serving platform.
MoPub CEO Jim Payne says that the startup continues to appeal to a range of publishers, but especially likes that game developers are willing to push the envelope move quickly and aggressively when it comes to advertising, especially on mobile.
