Apple Acquired Quattro Wireless for $275 Million?

[ariza910]

Quattro has an interesting connection to existing media outlets, from their website.

We [Quattro] are the monetization and technology platform partner for thousands of sites and application, including CBS Interactive, News Corp, Time Inc., Washington Post, New York Times and AP News.

Perfect fit for an Apple tablet thats being positioned as an answer to newspapers' problems.

I am surprised it took Apple this long to get into advertising. I guess Apple couldn't stand having Google make money off their iPhone mobile app platform. I would guess that a lot of developers have shifted their paid apps to free apps just to cut through the clutter and now rely solely on mobile advertising revenue. This sort of move has to be costing Apple a lot of money both from serving free apps and lost sales of former paid apps.

Ads in iTunes should be next. Dynamically inserted ads into the iTunes content is such a no brainer. If given the chance to buy a TV show on iTunes for $1.99 or Free + ads I am sure the majority of people would choose free + ads.

 

[liavman]

Does anyone else see this as a platform for providing ads in newspapers and magazines on the new MacTab/iSlate/whatever?

I do.

 

[liavman]

No, I will NOT tolerate ads on devices that I purchased, ever. And I will also NOT tolerate ads on services that I've paid for.

I am viewing macrumors on a purchased device ( laptop ) and I see advertisements all over the screen.

I agree about the service that we pay for. Cable TV has gotten away with it but not on HBO or Cinemax. So if you only partially pay for it, you have to suffer through ads.

It is more sinister than that. You are paying for broadband access at $40-$50 a month and these people are sending ads over that connection. Talk about free riding on your dime!!

 

[Full of Win]

Does anyone else see this as a platform for providing ads in newspapers and magazines on the new MacTab/iSlate/whatever?

Yes, oh yes. However, the Apple demographic is such a choice one (e.g. disposable income, gullible, and impressed with 'shiny' things) who could blame Apple for exploiting us?

 

[Peace]

Quattro has an interesting connection to existing media outlets, from their website.

We [Quattro] are the monetization and technology platform partner for thousands of sites and application, including CBS Interactive, News Corp, Time Inc., Washington Post, New York Times and AP News.

Perfect fit for an Apple tablet thats being positioned as an answer to newspapers' problems.

I am surprised it took Apple this long to get into advertising. I guess Apple couldn't stand having Google make money off their iPhone mobile app platform. I would guess that a lot of developers have shifted their paid apps to free apps just to cut through the clutter and now rely solely on mobile advertising revenue. This sort of move has to be costing Apple a lot of money both from serving free apps and lost sales of former paid apps.

Ads in iTunes should be next. Dynamically inserted ads into the iTunes content is such a no brainer. If given the chance to buy a TV show on iTunes for $1.99 or Free + ads I am sure the majority of people would choose free + ads.

I don't think magazine subscriptions will be free+ads. Probably something like $1.99 an issue+ads.

 

[gctwnl]

Seems defensive to me. Apple is not into advertizing, but is protecting the iPhone platform with an alternative provider against dependency on Google.

 

[BlackiBook]

I don't think magazine subscriptions will be free+ads. Probably something like $1.99 an issue+ads.

I agree they wouldn't let something that could be as profitable as magazines be free+ads....

 

[jb510]

This is brillant on Apple's part, IMHO.

First they paid 1/3 of what Google did for a mobile advertising firm. I don't think Apple needed to buy the market leader (AdMob) since Apple is already the market leader (AppStore). I think they'll do just fine with Quattro.

Second, Apple hs been losing money, or failing to capitalize on all the "free" ad supported iPhone apps. They'll start getting a cut from those free Apps, and don't be surprised to see some sort of incentive to use Apple/Quattro advertising model in the free apps... knowing Apple that might even be as heavy handed as forcing free apps to use Apple's banner ad servers with a revenue split between Apple and the developer... this would devestate AdMob.

Third, recall Apple's patent on ad-supported OSs. I could easily see a tablet's 3G service get subsidized by Apple/Mobile OS served ads.

Finally, the coup de grâce... recall Apple recently purchased a location based mapping company. Suddenly Apple is postioned to do location based advertising on both phones and tablets.

I don't see them getting into generic search advertsing like Google does, just targeted location based advertising and mobile app banner advertising.

 

[richard.mac]

when youre up in the recession, go for it. and Apple usually capitalise well on previous ideas/companies if they think they can make it better.

 

[OllyW]

Who? This company sounds like a car brand name.

The one that's bought them sounds like a record label name.

 

[stridemat]

I certainly hope that it is nothing to do with patent which surfaced awhile ago.

 

[jb510]

I certainly hope that it is nothing to do with patent which surfaced awhile ago.

As I wrote above I think it has EVERYTHING to do with that patent...

I'll go out on a limb and tie two other rumors together... In a move similar to Amazon's two Kindles will announce TWO tablets, one with a plastic case and an OS level advertising supporting a 3G connection and a second one in an aluminum unibody and standard 3G contract... the higher end model maybe getting an OLED screen too.

One last thing... I could also see Apple integrating served ads into iTunes to fund a streaming audio/video delivery system out of the LaLa acquisition.

 

[DipDog3]

Too bad they are not a wireless company...

I guess they got a better deal than Google who paid twice as much!

 

[robogobo]

offtopic...I have a little peeve; bear with me. When something is a "rumor", as they usually are on MacRumors, it's enough to just state it as if it were fact, and let the discussion begin. It doesn't always have to be in the form of a question. And yet, when I look at my news feeds, every line from MR is a question: "Apple said so-and-so about the new so-and-so?" "?" "????" come on! Stand behind your gossip! Do you think the little old ladies spreading rumors at the hairdresser use question marks? No way!

Just a bit irritating.

/offtopic

 

[Rot'nApple]

Great... more ads.

I hope not. I kind of like the thought of Apple's laptop not emblazoned with stickers, the likes of "Windows 7", "NVIDIA", or "Intel Inside"... Apple prides itself on aesthetics of the outward appearance of it's machines. Let us hope that the same philosophy will remain with the ever increasing internal ad war. It's bad enough to be taken to a web page and read the article and have the mouse pointer accidently trigger some ad video. Totally frustrating!

C'mon Apple, please don't head down that way... Don't "begoogle" us to death with ad sense and click through links. Be

 

[Winni]

Do you watch any cable TV?

I don't know about the guy whom you originally asked, but I haven't watched any TV since 1999. Actually, I find that TV has an insultingly low level, interrupted with a flood of even lower level advertisements.

I'm that odd person without an antenna on the roof in Truffaut's movie version of the great novel Fahrhenheit 451. ;-)

 

[Rot'nApple]

This company sounds like a car brand name.

I may be wrong but isn't "quattro" Spanish for the number 4 or is that spelled differently?

If it is, then "Quattro Wireless" is "4 Wireless" or "Four Wireless", which, conspiracy theory wise, is just a letter off from being "For Wireless" and aren't we all for wireless?!

 

[Lone Deranger]

You're not missing much. TV content is declining faster than ever before. So called "reality" TV is dumbing down viewers to unprecedented levels. That along with the large percentage of advertisements makes me wonder why people still bother with it.
I don't understand why people pay for cable TV only to be bombarded by ads for extended periods of time. Sad state of affairs indeed.

I don't know about the guy whom you originally asked, but I haven't watched any TV since 1999. Actually, I find that TV has an insultingly low level, interrupted with a flood of even lower level advertisements.

I'm that odd person without an antenna on the roof in Truffaut's movie version of the great novel Fahrhenheit 451. ;-)

 

[MrCrowbar]

I don't know about the guy whom you originally asked, but I haven't watched any TV since 1999. Actually, I find that TV has an insultingly low level, interrupted with a flood of even lower level advertisements.

I disagree (and I'm in Germany too). The production value, writing and acting of the commercials are much better than the actual program nowadays. Once after switching through every channel twice I just kinda gave up and settled for some channel playing commercials. When commercials were over the resuming program annoyed me and I looked for another channel playing commercials. And that was during prime time! That's when I knew I had to stop.

Apple acquiring an ad company is unsettling... I hate ads.

 

[Chupa Chupa]

Yes, oh yes. However, the Apple demographic is such a choice one (e.g. disposable income, gullible, and impressed with 'shiny' things) who could blame Apple for exploiting us?

Gullible? No Gullible is being convinced by the Best Buy sales guy that a Dell Inspiron is a rockin' machine.

 

[Chupa Chupa]

I don't know about the guy whom you originally asked, but I haven't watched any TV since 1999. Actually, I find that TV has an insultingly low level, interrupted with a flood of even lower level advertisements.

I'm that odd person without an antenna on the roof in Truffaut's movie version of the great novel Fahrhenheit 451. ;-)

Could just be Germany. There is some decent stuff worth watching in the U.S. Also we have DVRs which allow you to skip the ads like church on Sunday.

 

[moracity]

No, I will NOT tolerate ads on devices that I purchased, ever. And I will also NOT tolerate ads on services that I've paid for.

I guess you don't pay for cable/satellite tv or the internet?

 

[TraceyS/FL]

I hope not. I kind of like the thought of Apple's laptop not emblazoned with stickers, the likes of "Windows 7", "NVIDIA", or "Intel Inside"... Apple prides itself on aesthetics of the outward appearance of it's machines. Let us hope that the same philosophy will remain with the ever increasing internal ad war. It's bad enough to be taken to a web page and read the article and have the mouse pointer accidently trigger some ad video. Totally frustrating!

C'mon Apple, please don't head down that way... Don't "begoogle" us to death with ad sense and click through links. Be

Hopefully, this way the content providers will provide an "apple like" experience for their marketing and ads.

It sounds like they did this to be poised to HELP the content providers get onboard fast. Sounds like it is wayyyy more than a purchase of AdMob would have been....

 

[MisterK]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_2 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7D11 Safari/528.16)

I think that people are getting carried away here. Just because Apple bought these guys doesn't mean that they're about to poster ads absolutely everywhere. I think this is probably for the slate and serving up ads the same way newspapers and magazines do. That's all. Writing all that content could become very expensive for publishers if we're used to only paying a couple dollars for stuff. TV and movies have their other outlets (including ad supported cable) they can rely on.

 

[crackbookpro]

Certainly a lot cheaper than Admob cost Google... so is Apple just going to start buying up advertising companies to prevent Google from buying them and getting information about the App Store market place?

...could be one reason, for sure.