(Bloomberg) — VideoAmp Inc., a software and data startup that competes against industry stalwart Nielsen Holdings Plc’s media-measurement offerings, is exploring an initial public offering as soon as next year, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
The Los Angeles-based company has held discussions with potential underwriters about a potential U.S. listing, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private talks. An IPO is expected to value VideoAmp at a premium to its most recent private-market valuation of $1.4 billion, they said.
VideoAmp spokeswoman Stephanie Doennecke declined to comment.
The company, led by founder and Chief Executive Officer Ross McCray, said in October that it raised $275 million from investors including Tiger Global Management LLC, Epiq Capital Group, Dan Sundheim’s D1 Capital Partners, Spruce House Partnership and Ankona Capital. VideoAmp said at the time it would use the funding to accelerate the rollout of its services for the advertising industry across traditional television, streaming video and digital platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and YouTube, with the goal of disrupting the $120 billion U.S. advertising market.
“While the ability to consume content on any device at any time is great for the consumer, the legacy media measurement and currency systems powering these services are fragmented, riddled with complexity and inaccurate,” McCray said in the October statement.
Advertisers have struggled to find the best metric to measure audiences on the internet. Streaming services such as Netflix and Disney+ don’t offer advertising, while Google and Facebook use different measurements.
While Nielsen has been the standard-bearer for TV measurement for decades, its practices have come under fire in recent years, prompting both media companies and entrepreneurs to come up with alternatives.
(Updates with VideoAmp declining to comment in third paragraph.)
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