Nielsen Boosts Mobile Capability with Telephia Buy

Nielsen is acquiring San Francisco-based syndicated telecom MR firm Telephia, in a move designed to accelerate measurement of consumer behaviour across the $350 billion mobile phone sector. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Telephia was founded in 1998 and offers measurement tools and large-scale consumer panels tracking the behaviour and attitudes of digital consumers. This includes tracking of subscriber mobile phone market share on behalf of clients in the US, Canada and Europe, from all sectors of the telecom and mobile markets. It has also begun to track and measure audiences for video content distributed over mobiles.

The deal comes three weeks after the unveiling of Nielsen Wireless, overseen by Chicago-based VP Jeff Herrmann (www.mrweb.com/drno/news6051.htm ). The new service is being rolled out in several phases. Initially it will assess the size of the market and determine how various offerings impact traditional mobile phone use; the second phase will involve measuring mobile content.

Through its Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement (A2/M2) initiative Nielsen is committed to measuring consumer use of video and online activity on any platform on which consumers can access content. Susan Whiting, Nielsen Executive VP explained the background to the buy-out: 'Combining Nielsen's worldwide strengths and measurement expertise with Telephia's cutting edge research and measurement capabilities in the mobile content arena expands our capabilities in the vital, high-growth telecom and mobile media markets.'

Telephia will retain its San Francisco corporate headquarters, as well as members of its senior management team. The two companies said no discussion has yet taken place about whether Telephia will re-brand.

Sid Gorham, President and CEO of Telephia added: 'With access to all the expertise, complementary products, and global resources of The Nielsen Company, we will be able to better serve clients in the rapidly evolving telecom and mobile media markets.'

Telephia's homepage is at www.telephia.com while Nielsen is online at www.nielsen.com .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.

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