Adtech Firm Adform Explores Sale, Potential Signal of M&A Bounceback

• Adform is exploring a sale, one other signal of a rebound within the adtech M&A market.
• Adform, based in 2002, affords merchandise for each advertisers and publishers.
• Adform declined to remark.

The Nordic adtech firm Adform is exploring a sale, 4 folks aware of its plans informed Enterprise Insider. A deal would mark the newest signal that the adtech M&A market is bouncing again after a few tepid years.

The 4 folks stated Adform had appointed Carnegie, a Swedish funding financial institution, to steer the method. They requested for anonymity to guard their enterprise relationships; their identities are recognized to BI.

A type of folks stated Adform requested potential consumers to submit their bids in April.

Adform and Carnegie declined to remark.

Based in Denmark in 2002, Adform is likely one of the oldest impartial adtech corporations. Not like lots of its rivals, which are likely to concentrate on both the advertiser aspect or writer aspect of advert transactions, Adform affords options for each.

These embrace a demand-side platform that helps advertisers purchase and handle their advert campaigns throughout varied media channels, information administration platforms that assist each advertisers and publishers manage their information, and advert servers the place its shoppers can retailer their adverts and monitor their campaigns.

These belongings may very well be enticing to different adtech corporations, personal fairness companies, or the rising variety of corporations which have lately launched so-called retail media and commerce media companies, similar to supermarkets, e-commerce platforms, apps, and journey and leisure corporations.

Whereas it has been round a very long time, Adform has struggled to achieve the sort of traction available in the market loved by its US rivals, similar to Google and The Commerce Desk.

Adform reported income of 88.6 million euros, round $97 million, in 2023, down 3.7% from the prior 12 months, in line with its most lately revealed annual report. The corporate stated the decline mirrored financial uncertainty that led to advertisers decreasing their advertising and marketing spend. “EBITDA earlier than particular earnings,” its measure of profitability, got here in at 16.9 million euros, or round $18.5 million. The corporate stated it employed round 669 workers on common all through 2023.

Adform had as soon as deliberate to go public with hopes of elevating $100 million, however it shelved its preliminary public providing in 2018, blaming the volatility within the monetary markets on the time. The corporate has lengthy been the topic of potential takeover rumors.

The adtech M&A market seems to be revving again into motion after a quiet couple of years marred by advert spend slowdowns, financial volatility, and uncertainty across the affect of privateness and coverage modifications from the likes of Apple and Google.

Notable offers up to now this 12 months have included:

• T-Cell’s purchases of the outside media firm Vistar and the location-based advert specialist Blis
• The Commerce Desk buying metadata startup Sincera
• DoubleVerify shopping for the attribution platform Rockerbox
• Advert company large Publicis choosing up information collaboration platform Lotame