Roku brings CTV inventory to FreeWheel

Roku and FreeWheel have expanded their partnership to make Roku inventory available programmatically to FreeWheel’s demand-side programmatic partners, the companies announced today. Ad Age Tech Power List 2025 We’re looking for top digital innovators from agencies, brands, platforms, ad tech companies and tech startups Enter here The inventory originates from Roku Exchange, the connected TV company’s offering to serve ads across its channels based on audience targets, which includes traditional video ad breaks in owned channels such as Roku Channel as well as among shared inventory in apps hosted on Roku. Through programmatic platforms, advertisers get greater visibility into their marketing both in streaming apps that run on Roku as well as the Roku inventory that surrounds it, reducing the likelihood of duplicating reach with the same audiences. “The truth is, we all know the complexity of CTV—the same viewer watching the same content can be served an ad through many multiples of supply paths, which create not just complexity, but cost,” said Greg Bel, executive director of strategic partnerships at FreeWheel. The partnership will make Roku inventory available to FreeWheel’s demand partners, including The Trade Desk, Beeswax, Google’s Display & Video 360 and Xandr. This will allow larger numbers of advertisers to access Roku inventory through FreeWheel’s network and allow advertisers to monitor and measure campaigns on the CTV platforms alongside programmatic buys with other media companies. Creative news: Roku vents about TV watching problems in ads Previously, Roku had partnered with FreeWheel, the ad tech company owned by Comcast, to offer access to its data technologies for targeting and campaign optimization. Through its devices, Roku is able to target viewers and measure performance across 85.5 million households, according to Roku. This can allow advertisers to separate linear and streaming viewers, and continuously update advertising based on viewer behavior on Roku devices. “Our strategy over the last year or two has been to make Roku Media available where the market is,” said Adam Royle, director of ads business development and strategic partnerships at Roku, noting that the size of FreeWheel’s programmatic network was a major step in upgrading Roku’s programmatic availability for advertisers. Royle said that Roku previously was “less interoperable” across market access to inventory and capabilities, and it’s beginning to reach market parity. While Royle declined to specify plans for future expansion, he said it would make sense to begin adding additional inventory, such as display advertising in Roku’s home screen or larger sponsorships, to programmatic partnerships. Also: What Omnicom-IPG means for the media marketplace “Marketers today are looking for increased scale and better performance, and this integration helps brands holistically reach audiences across the viewing experience—something that has always been important to us as we work to unify the programmatic and digital video landscape,” said Eyal Ebel, senior VP, Publicis Media Exchange platform partnerships, in a statement. The move also comes as Roku has been making moves to attract more advertisers. Earlier this year, Roku launched the Roku Ads Manager, a self-serve platform aimed at allowing small and medium-sized marketers without the budget or capabilities for traditional TV advertising to buy Roku inventory.

Roku brings CTV inventory to FreeWheel

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