Measurement firm EDO secured an $80 million investment on Wednesday from Los Angeles-based Shamrock Capital.
EDO was founded in 2015 by actor Edward Norton and Dr. Daniel Nadler as an artificial intelligence operation, and now provides data science insights for media and advertising. The investment is expected to enhance the company’s Ad EnGage Convergent TV analytics platform, which helps advertisers measure real-time actions and responses to traditional or streaming TV adverts. Its clients include Discovery, NBCUniversal, Amazon Studios, Fox, Paramount and Warner Bros.
Shamrock Capital Partner Laura Held praised EDO’s unique approach to the sector. “We quickly identified EDO as a strategically differentiated player at the forefront of innovation in a massively valuable global ecosystem,” she said. “EDO has amassed an impressive network of partners, clients and team members who we believe are reshaping what is possible from Convergent TV measurement, ad performance and consumer engagement insights.”
Future currency
Companies are looking to fill a gap in the market shaped by perceived inefficiencies in advertising analytics. EDO is one of those players currently exploring new measurement currencies that better reflect streaming habits and online behaviour. Measurement giant Nielsen was sold last week, having being stripped of its Media Rating Council (MRC) accreditation amid growing criticism of its methodology. Last month the Video Advertising Bureau (VAB) went as far as to call Nielsen’s data “unusable”.
EDO claims to have “fundamentally changed” the effectiveness of TV advertising metrics. “Weak proxies and soft signal don’t cut it anymore when our customers know they can get real-time, always-on measurement that confidently predicts business outcomes and allows them to optimise while campaigns are in flight,” said Kevin Krim, president and chief executive at EDO. “The industry is hungry for a whole new definition of ‘currency,’ especially one that inherently reflects the fair value of what’s being bought and sold — that is outcome measurement.”
