Twitter's MoPub Expands Native Ad Capabilities

In an effort to help publishers optimize sales and performance of mobile ad inventory, Twitter-owned MoPub has unveiled its own mediation for native ad networks. This new feature makes it possible to manage multiple native ad sources with a single software development kit (SDK).

Previously, mobile publishers who used MoPub could choose only one ad source. If they wanted to work with multiple native ad sources in their apps, they had to dedicate extra resources to custom work. But now, with the mediation feature, publishers can implement a single SDK to manage more than one ad network.

 

MoPub’s new product looks quite a bit like Google’s AdMob Mediation, which coordinates with ad networks and publishers to increase monetization as well. But different from Google, MoPub mediation is specifically designed for native ad networks – only standard ad units such as banners and interstitials – and it does not support direct ad serving or real-time bidding.

Twitter rival Facebook introduced its own mobile ad network, called Facebook Audience Network (FAN), in April of this year. So will MoPub’s new feature pose a threat to FAN?

For now, it seems the answer is no. A source familiar with the product tells ClickZ that there’s no direct competition between MoPub and FAN, because MoPub is not an ad network, but a mediation platform that can help publishers manage ad networks like FAN. Of course, Twitter and Facebook are still huge rivals for mobile ad dollars, but this move by MoPub simply strengthens the relationship and allows the two to work together.

Twitter acquired MoPub for a hefty $350 million in September of 2013. The two companies said at the time that through the acquisition, they aimed to improve MoPub’s publisher platform and “bring better native advertising to the mobile ecosystem.”

With this new mediation feature, it looks like Twitter and MoPub are one step closer to achieving that goal.