Yahoo! is paying $15-20 million for ClarityRay, which offers solutions for circumventing ad blockers.
Israeli start-up ClarityRay, which develops tools to assist web publishers to circumvent ad blockers and to combat theft of advertising space has been sold to US Internet giant Yahoo! for $15-20 million dollars in cash. This is Yahoo!’s second acquisition in Israel in a month.
ClarityRay was founded by its CEO Ido Yablonka, Vadim Zak and Guy Pitelko, all of whom served in the IDF Intelligence Corps.
ClarityRay offers two products designed to counter the loss of revenue caused by ad blockers. One allows sites to collect a monthly payment from surfers who do not wish to see advertisements, while the other is a technological solution that enables content publishers to circumvent the add-ons that block advertisements.
Yahoo! said in a statement, “We’ve been working on building up security capabilities and making Yahoo a safer place for users and partners. Advertising is an essential part of our business here at Yahoo, and we’re committed to getting it right. ClarityRay is a company with deep expertise in ad-malware detection and prevention. The bottom line for Yahoo is that search is going to get better and safer for users, and advertising will become more reliable and profitable for partners.”
A month ago, Yahoo! acquired Israeli video-streaming start-up RayV for an undisclosed sum.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news – www.globes-online.com