Engage Launches AdManager 5.2 in Asia

U.S.-based software solutions and advertising network Engage Wednesday announced the launch of its Ad Manager 5.2 and Ad Bureau advertising management software in Asia.

Colin Mackintosh, president of Engage Asia/Australia, said that the timing for the products’ launch is excellent because publishers “are not using [their advertising software] to get more customers and get them coming back,” he said in a telephone interview.

Even with Asia’s online advertising market growing 50 percent per year, according to Engage data, 70 percent of advertising sales goes to the top 50 sites. “You must be a leader or it becomes very difficult,” he said, adding, “the top publishers will win out on the advertising revenue.”

Ad Manager 5.2 is designed to serve ads across multiple media channels, including Flash, WAP, and streaming media, said Klyve Dawson, Engage Asia/Australia’s business development and client services director. The interface is available in simplified and traditional Chinese, Korean, and Japanese, along with several European languages, Dawson said.

The software is designed to give publishers a simple ad management solution that they can maintain themselves, and the results for which can be read and understood by both publishers and their ad clients. Ad Bureau is an ASP edition of Ad Manager for those sites that do not wish to purchase their own solution.

Engage already has over 20 clients for Ad Manager in Asia, including PacFusion and China Times Interactive, Mackintosh said. In the United States, Microsoft serves 400 million ads per day on only four such Engage ad engines, he said.

Steven Schwankert is managing editor of asia.internet.com.