Samba TV Buys TV Spot Analytics Firm Axwave

Television data and audience analytics company Samba TV has acquired media exposure analyst Axwave. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

Axwave's automated content recognition (ACR) technology uses microphone-based audio fingerprinting to match viewing against a database of hundreds of TV channels, 120,000 VOD shows and 130,000 ads; and can also identify TV ads from in-screen video analysis. According to Samba, the addition of Axwave's commercial scheduling, metadata, currency grade cross-media panel management and analysis will allow advertisers to access detailed insights on TV commercials for their brands and competitors at global scale.

Samba will combine its own AI-driven commercial break detection from twenty million households worldwide with Axwave's workflow for automatic detection and tagging of TV spots and its use of computer vision for logos and brands in linear video. In addition, Axwave's TV spot detection will be incorporated into Samba's Causal TV Attribution solution, which measures which TV strategies are driving incremental lift in ad effectiveness.

Samba co-founder and CEO Ashwin Navin (pictured) comments: 'Technology developed by the Axwave team defined the market for commercial monitoring in the US and Europe implemented by companies like the BBC, Comscore, Ipsos and the National Basketball Association (NBA). With this acquisition, we're not only adding a team of exceptional technologists, we're also solving a major industry challenge by providing the world's most robust and accurate TV ad schedule for global brands'.

Web site: www.samba.tv .