Unruly Asia MD Vijay Anand Kunduri joins PubMatic to lead APAC OTT biz as VP

Digital advertising agency PubMatic has appointed ad tech executive Vijay Anand Kunduri as its regional VP of OTT business in APAC. In his new role, Kunduri (pictured) is tasked with accelerating the growth of the PubMatic OTT and video business across the region, consulting with existing publishers, creating new relationships, and further establishing PubMatic as a preferred platform for media buyers and publishers.

Kunduri was most recently MD for video advertising company Unruly in Asia, and has over two decades of experience working with leading broadcast, video-on-demand, and digital companies across the Asia Pacific region. Over the last decade, Kunduri has helped to establish American and European ad tech companies in the Asia Pacific region, including setting up video ad network Adotube in Southeast Asia and spearheading Switzerland-based Viewster’s move into the VOD and OTT markets in the region.

Kunduri said that there has been explosive growth in the adoption of connected screens and consumption of streaming content in the Asia Pacific region. “Brands and OTT publishers have a tremendous opportunity to engage consumers and find new revenue with programmatic partners like PubMatic that offer the optimal combination of technology and premium advertiser and content partnerships,” he added.

Kunduri’s appointment comes as PubMatic continues to expand its commitment to the development of the OTT marketplace. In its Q2 earnings announcement this year, PubMatic’s revenue from the advertising formats of mobile and omnichannel video, which includes OTT and connected TV, grew 108% year-on-year and represented 65% of its total revenue. It also introduced a connected TV header bidding product, OpenWrap OTT, which enables ad buyers to benefit from the same efficiencies they find in other formats using unified auctions.

Separately, PubMatic partnered with MediaMath in February this year to make its ad supply in Asia available to MediaMath buyers. This was done through MediaMath’s omnichannel media buying platform SOURCE, which will see PubMatic bringing added display, mobile, and connected TV inventory from a roster of publishers across Southeast Asia including LINE, KLY, Detik.com, Kompas Gramedia, ABS-CBN, and Sanook. Launched in 2019, SOURCE aims to be transparent with advertisers and help them optimise their media-buying strategies. According to PubMatic, publishers have been asking for increased transparency, and brands and media buyers want better insights into the inventory they are acquiring. Marketing Interactive