This news just dropped which is great for APP: Stagwell enters strategic partnership with AppLovin - TipRanks.com
For those unfamiliar with Stagwell, they are one of a handful of big, global advertising holding companies. I used to work for one of their agencies. While they are on the smaller end of the spectrum, they still command around $5B in media spend.
One thing that always interested me about APP is they were strictly “direct to client” and were circumventing agencies. Eliminating the middle man allows them to have more direct access to budgets, but in my experience they are probably competing for a slice of budget that isn’t already committed to the media buying agencies, rather than the whole pie. It also seems like creating an enemy where there doesn’t need to be one - for instance, Meta benefits greatly from media agencies selling their platform to clients.
As APP tries to bridge outside of mobile and into cross-device advertising, they will need to be able to tap budgets that are typically dedicated to brand-building (and given to the holding companies) vs. performance marketing. This seems like a big step, and typically when one holdco makes a move, the rest follow.
They seem to be making the right decisions to make sure their growth doesn’t slow any time soon.