Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group said it agreed to a 10-year deal making VideoAmp its primary and preferred advertising currency, effective immediately.
Allen had announced at the company's upfront presentation in April that this company would be using VideoAmp as currency in the upfronts, beginning with The Weather Channel.
Allen has sued Nielsen for fraud, alleging that Nielsen measurement failure cost his company money.
The length of the deal with VideoAmp — one of several new companies using big data from set-top boxes and smart TVs to challenge Nielsen, which has dominated the TV measurement world for decades — makes it very unusual.
“What’s unique about this deal is Allen Media Group is the first to say VideoAmp is the primary currency, not the alternative,“ VideoAmp founder and CEO Ross McCray said. “It’s a huge step forward for the entire industry as we are making measurement more accurate and equitable for everyone.”
VideoAmp’s big dataset incorporates 39 million households and multiple data sources, providing more accurate, representative and effective ways of measuring an advertiser’s media spend across screens, the company said.
“Reliable big data measurement is much needed and will save the industry,“ Byron Allen, founder, chairman and CEO of Allen Media Group, said. “This is something we have been waiting on for a long time — a company to come along and break the mold, to take us to the next level and to measure our channels properly. For Allen Media Group, that solution is VideoAmp.”
Allen and McCray announced the deal at the VideoAmp Summit, taking place in Cannes, France.
