Bidstack transitions from proof of concept to revenue generation
released a trading update on Friday revealing it had surpassed the £300,000 mark for revenues generated in 2018. The recently listed company has had considerable success after partnering with the Football Manager franchise, generating over 1m impressions per day in Asia alone.
It has managed to thus far sign 9 games for multi-year exclusive ad contracts and incorporate its proprietary platform successfully with approximately 20 advertisers. It has also placed digital advertising for a number of global brands, including 188 Bet, BooHoo Man, Audi, MG Motors and Volkswagen.
Bidstack CEO James Draper said: “the Company has successfully transitioned from proof of concept to revenue generation through the platform.” “We have made good progress against our stated objectives since coming to the market in September 2018.”
Since IPO, Bidstack has been expanding its sales team and refining its proprietary technology,which is capable of inserting adverts into natural advertising space into video games across multiple platforms.
A selling point of the technology is that impressions are more easily quantified, more so than a traditional printed medium, and are naturally placed, in other words, “native”. For example: an advertisement on a billboard in a football manager game, is considered natural advertising space.
Bidstack's contracts ensure it has exclusive access to the native in-game advertising space within the video games from the developers or publishers, to then sell that advertising space.
The fact that it considers itself as the 'custodian' of video game developer real estate, it is appealing to both game developers and advertisers who value “natural” advertising space, to ensure that advertising copy respects the artwork of the finished video game product, and of course, more effective advertising spend.
Mr. Draper added that Bidstack is serving “digital dynamic advertising into games across different continents, proving that the platform can scale globally.”
After going live with the end-to-end programmatic supply side platform PubMatic, a platform that allows advertising buyers to select Bidstack’s media channels (embedded in-game advertising) to meet their audience profile needs, the company has been able to experience ‘frictionless scalability’.
What is exciting for a company like Bidstack is the fact that the video gaming industry is worth £3.86bn ($4.85bn), more than the video and music industry combined, according to the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA). It has doubled its value since 2007, showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
Furthermore, the figures do not take into account the success of mobile and free games such as Fortnite, which has over 200 million players worldwide – an area Bidstack is seeking to enter.
Bidstack is essentially offering the opportunity to pitch a new media channel to clients, rather than tv or social media. And if the growth of video games continues, they may find themslves as the media owner of a significantly large media asset base.
The company has stated that one of its core goals is to become the “go-to media owner of native in-game advertising”.
Interestingly, the growing interconnectivity, higher broadband capacities, and the growing popularity of esports, makes it an exciting time and ideal entry point into the area, where similar previous players in the past, such as Massive Incorporated (bought by Microsoft for over $200m in 2006) were slightly too early.
The company is reportedly in discussions with more leading games developers and publishers for further exclusive partnerships. Mr. Draper revealed that its agreement with Sports Interactive Games (Football Manager) lead to “a lot of inbound interest from game publishers large and small”.
The company is backed by Scotland's richest woman, Ann Gloag OBE, who acquired a 3% stake in the company, along by the management team who are highly incentivised in terms of stock, with CEO James Draper holding over 20%.
Listen to James Draper, Chief Executive Officer of Bidstack discuss the company and the recent trading update (Interview starts at 13 minutes 1 seconds)
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