The MSOs involved with Project Canoe – now formally known as Canoe Ventures – confirmed that they have hired ad exec David Verklin to lead the organization.
Meanwhile, it appears the concept of Canoe is still being modified.
Verklin was CEO of Aegis Media Americas, where he managed all operations in the U.S., Latin America and Canada and served on the company’s board. He began his career at Young & Rubicam in New York and helped found advertising agency Hal Riney & Partners in San Francisco. He’s the co-author of “Watch This, Listen Up, Click Here.”
He is charged with “the creation of shared processes and standards for more robust audience targeting, interactivity and measurement in multi-platform advertising across cable operators’ systems throughout the country,” according to Canoe Ventures.
Canoe Ventures plans to sell its new technology, not to marketers directly, but to programmers such as Walt Disney’s ESPN or Viacom’s MTV, Verklin explained in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. Programmers will then be able to offer the services to their advertisers.
Originally, the MSOs involved expected to create their own national advertising organizations to sell ads. That approach would have cut out programmers, however. Rather than alienate programmers, cable is shifting to the approach outlined by Verklin.
Verklin will join Canoe Ventures, effective Aug. 4.
The organization will be based in New York City. The members of Canoe Ventures are Bright House Networks, Cablevision Systems, Charter Communications, Comcast, Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable.
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