Dutch telecom Altice acquires adtech Teads for €285m
Dutch telecoms company Altice has agreed to acquire French video adtech start-up Teads for €285m ($307m), subject to Teads reaching 2017 revenue targets. Altice will integrate Teads as a subsidiary division. Teads has pioneered outstream video ad formats, where video ads autoplay when they become viewable on screen. Adtech firms are increasingly appealing to telecoms companies as verified subscriber data offers targeted audience engagement and greater ad efficacy.
Teads CEO Bertrand Quesada. Teads

France-based video ad tech startup Teads has been snapped up by Dutch telecommunications company Altice, several sources told Business Insider.

Shortly after this article was first published, Altice confirmed the acquisition in a press release.

Altice will purchase Teads at a value of €285 million ($307 million) on a cash and debt free basis. The purchase price is subject to Teads meeting revenue targets in 2017.

Teads will become a division of Altice following the transaction, making it the latest in a string of ad tech companies — from AOL and Yahoo to Verizon, Turn to Singtel, and Tapad to Telenor — to be acquired by a telco.

Telecoms firms have increasingly become interested in ad tech firms as their repositories of verified subscriber data are highly valuable to advertisers looking to target particular segments of consumers with their online ads, as well as to measure whether those ads led to effective outcomes.

The French ad tech company is known as the pioneer of the outstream video ad format — where video ads appear within the context of an article and autoplay when the ad is viewable on screen.

The format has been jumped upon by publishers because it allows them to offer highly lucrative video ad inventory without needing to create video content for it to appear in front of.

Founded in 2011, Teads raised $55 million in funding, according to CrunchBase. The company said it generated $200 million in revenue in 2016 (most likely a gross, rather than net revenue figure), which represented 39% organic growth year-on-year. Teads said it has also been EBITDA (earnings before income, tax, depreciation, and amortization)-positive for the past four years.

Altice acquired US-based Cablevision for around $17.7 billion in 2016, making it the fourth-largest broadband provider in the States, with more than 4.6 million customers in the region. The highly-acquisitive company, which is owned by French billionaire Patrick Drahi, also recently acquired ad tech platform Audience Partners for an undisclosed amount earlier this month.

Altice reported a 0.2% increase in revenue year-on-year to $25.2 billion (€23.5 billion) in 2016.

Update: This article and headline was updated after it was originally published to accurately reflect Teads' acquisition price. The article had previously stated the acquisition valued Teads at "roughly $322 million".