Telefonica establishes independent mobile advertising agency, Axonix

Telefonica is establishing its own mobile advertising exchange as a joint venture with Blackstone’s GSO Capital Partners (GSO).

The new ad agency, Axonix will be powered by technology acquired by Telefónica and Blackstone’s GSO Capital that underpinned the programmatic advertising platform, MobClix.

Simon Birkenhead has been appointed CEO of Axonix, leaving his current role as Telefónica’s director of Global Advertising Sales. The newly formed company will have a completely new executive management team and will operate globally with its headquarters in London.

Axonix will initially offer a self-service, mobile ad exchange platform to advertisers and publishers globally but with a specific focus on US and Europe, plus Latin America where Telefonica has local scale. Over 100 demand partners are already integrated into the Axonix platform.

Telefonica added that the use of its audience data, anonymised and aggregated, through a programmatic trading platform will enable Axonix to deliver improved ad relevancy and performance.