Mobile advertising firm madvertise has bought Turkish premium mobile ad network Mobilike, which sells advertising inventory on behalf of media groups such as DYH, whose properties include ntvmsnbc, Star TV, NTVSpor.net, and CNBC-e, as well as independent publishers and developers.
According to madvertise, Mobilike has a 60 per cent share, and delivers over 300m page impressions each month. The acquisition of Mobilike will boost madvertise’s monthly impression count to almost 2bn.
Talking to Mobile Marketing, madvertise CEO Carsten Frien said there was a good fit between the two companies, since Mobilike currently uses third party ad-serving technology, and would now switch to madvertise’s own technology platform.
“The acquisition instantly gives us a 60 per cent market share in Turkey, so is a much faster option that starting from scratch,” Frien told us. “There is also a very good fit between our technical expertise, and their local market know-how and sales and business development expertise.” 
Frien added that madvertise is also looking at other acquisitions, following its Series B funding round in October 2010, which raised $10m (£6.3m). He said: “There are no other hot targets, but we have our own offices in the UK, France, Italy, Spain and Germany, and representation in Austria and Switzerland, so we cover 75 per cent of the western European market, measured by ad budget. Turkey is our first step into the Middle East, and we plan to use it as a launchpad into the region, pushing out into Saudi Arabia, Jordania, Egypt and other markets.”
The terms of the deal were not disclosed, though Fren said the sum paid makes “a lot of financial sense”. He also said that madvertise would be undertaking another significant funding round in Q4, 2012.
