Channel 4 Joins European Broadcaster Exchange

Channel 4 has aligned itself with the new digital ad sales partnership established by ProSiebenSat.1 (Germany), TF1 (France) and Mediaset (Italy and Spain), with each broadcaster taking an equal 25-percent stake in the business.

European Broadcaster Exchange (EBX) is a newly created digital ad sales venture to be headquartered in London as the hub for planning pan-European campaigns. Expected to launch trading in early 2018, the joint venture will establish a European video-on-demand exchange to cater to the growing demand for multi-territory video campaigns at scale, initially traded programmatically.

ProSiebenSat.1, TF1 and Mediaset’s involvement in the JV has already been approved by the European competition authorities and cleared by antitrust. Channel 4 joining will be subject to similar European competition and antitrust approvals.

Jonathan Lewis, the head of digital and partnership innovation at Channel 4, said: “The demand for multi-territory digital ad campaigns in brand safe and transparent environments is increasing as the programmatic video ad market continues to grow exponentially across Europe. Our investment allows Channel 4 to cater for this demand exclusively in the U.K. market and forge closer strategic and commercially successful partnerships with key broadcasters in European markets which will in turn generate new digital revenues for Channel 4 to reinvest back into the U.K. creative sector.”