That was the relatively easy part. Now Infillion CEO Rob Emrich must make good on a business plan to get MediaMath back to earning $100 million in net revenue within 4 years. Infillion plans to integrate MediaMath with its other adtech assets and to offer a new, bespoke solution to help big retailers, ecommerce platforms, healthcare, and other companies grow their own advertising businesses.
Emrich has described the new offering as a “walled garden as a service,” where other companies could build ad-buying platforms from MediaMath’s tech to service advertisers.
“Walled garden” is terminology often used in adtech parlance, where a publisher — like Facebook or YouTube for example — controls all aspects of ad buying on their sites and apps. Emrich said as the trend toward data privacy accelerates, this kind of offering will help advertiser clients use their customer data in closed and more trusted environments.
Emrich also plans to revive MediaMath’s traditional demand-side platform business. DSPs are software tools that help advertisers automate and optimize their ad buying across the web, apps, and other media. It’s aiming to relaunch the MediaMath platform in early 2024.
Former MediaMath clients included Macy’s, Staples, Sanofi, and T-Mobile.
The big challenge ahead
Resurrecting MediaMath will be a substantial challenge. The company, once valued at more than $1 billion, went into liquidation owing more than $125 million to its creditors, some of which may be cautious about working with MediaMath again. Its closure led to hundreds of job losses, and many of those staffers have gone on to find new roles. Some former MediaMath employees are still out of pocket by thousands of dollars in outstanding salary and expenses payments. Having shut down operations at the end June, many former clients will have been forced to switch to competitors, such as the publicly traded adtech company The Trade Desk and Google.
Read the story behind the story: MediaMath seemed destined for a $1B fairy-tale exit. Instead, most early investors got nothing.
Emrich said he believes there’s still a lot of goodwill in the market for the MediaMath brand and its legacy as the first demand-side platform, despite its recent financial turmoil.
“With a good leader, particularly a good CRO and a sales team trained on the same message, they can revive the brand,” said Tom Triscari, CEO of the technology research company Leomade Projects.
Re-establishing good will
As part of the bankruptcy sale, Infillion opted to bury $84 million in clawback claims it could have made to vendors for the money MediaMath had sent out to them shortly before it went bankrupt.
“It allowed us to start on a really, really good foot with all of the ecosystem partners,” Emrich said.
Infillion isn’t on the hook for the $125 million in liabilities tied up in the Chapter 11 process, which MediaMath owed to supply-side platforms, data vendors, publishers, and other suppliers.
Infillion has managed to hire back four former MediaMath employees since the deal closed, Emirch said, mostly on the tech and product side. He declined to name them. Emrich did confirm that some former staffers were reluctant to return, having felt burned by the bankruptcy.
The most high-profile former MediaMather — cofounder and former CEO Joe Zawadzki, who was ousted by the company’s board in 2021 — is also playing a part behind the scenes. Zawadzki and his adtech focused venture capital firm Aperiam Ventures are providing Infillion with strategic advice on getting MediaMath back off the ground.
“Aperiam — and Joe in particular — they’re incredibly connected,” said Emrich.
Aperiam had been hoping to raise money through an investor syndicate to buy back the MediaMath assets itself, Insider previously reported. When the bid to enter the auction rose beyond what the syndicate was hoping to raise, Aperiam instead began advising Infillion through the bidding process. Zawadzki had also been in discussions about a possible seat on the Infillion board, Emrich confirmed, but he added there were no plans for that to happen at this time.
Eric Franchi, general partner at Aperiam Ventures, said the firm was happy MediaMath had landed with Infillion given its commitment to bring back former employees, maintain the brand, and restore client and partner activity — including some Aperiam portfolio companies that had previously been active on the platform.
Improved outlook
Some former insiders and adtech experts have said that MediaMath was slow to jump on newer advertising trends like connected-TV. Emrich said Infillion’s other assets like TrueX, the connected-TV ad platform it acquired from Disney, can benefit MediaMath.
Emrich previously told Insider that Infillion is preparing to take $30 million in operating losses on MediaMath over the next three years. That will include an outlay of $40 million in working capital and $102 million in other operating expenses as it brings back the platform and aims to get back to about 155 people by the end of the third year.
Emrich doesn’t think he’ll raise money to support the effort. MediaMath 1.0 was generating $100 million in net revenue in 2022 and was ultimately pulled under by its debt burden and resulting cashflow issues, he said, and Infillion isn’t laden with debt and has a strong financial partner and balance sheet.
“The reality of determining how much money we lose standing this thing up is how quickly we get customers to get back on,” Emrich said.
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