Taboola is a public advertising company headquartered in New York City. It provides "content recommendation" sponsored links to advertising partners.[2]
History
Taboola was founded in 2007[3] by Adam Singolda.[4] The company was founded in Israel[5] and initially provided a recommendation engine for video content.[3] The company headquarters were later moved to New York City.[6] Taboola raised $1.5 million in funding in November 2007.[7] This was followed by $4.5 million in November 2008 and $9 million in August 2011.[8] Additionally, Taboola raised $15 million in February 2013.[9] By 2019, Taboola was used to provide 450 billion recommendations every month,[10] due to adoption by major news websites, like the IBM-owned The Weather Company.[11]
In 2014, Taboola acquired a California-based programmatic advertising company called Perfect Market.
In October 2019, Taboola announced its intention to merge with its rival, Outbrain, subject to regulatory approval.[17] If implemented, the deal would have combined the internet's two largest content-recommendation companies. The aim of this merger was for the two companies to reach a bigger audience in order to be more competitive against the advertising activities of companies like Google and Facebook.[18] Under the terms of the deal, Taboola would have paid Outbrain shareholders 30 percent of the combined company's stock and $250 million in cash.[19]
The sharp downturn in advertising revenue caused by the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 was felt more keenly by Taboola and Outbrain due to increasing pushback by advertisers for the low-quality ads being placed by these companies.[20] This market negative dynamic brought back Taboola and Outbrain to the negotiating table. Both companies stated their ad rates dropped by double digits at the start of the pandemic. The Wall Street Journal reported that the drop in revenue made it harder for Taboola and Outbrain to continue to make their fixed payments to publishers. In September 2020, Taboola and Outbrain could not agree on revised terms and decided to continue as independent organizations. Taboola CEO Adam Singolda said the merger "failed because of the financial contribution of Outbrain" in the previous 12 months. Singolda also said Outbrain “tried to do a deal that was equity only (but less equity), or equity and cash (but less cash) that matched Outbrain’s financial contribution to Taboola."[21] The combined valuation of the called off merger would have been $2 billion.[22]
On 30 June 2021, Taboola began publicly trading on the Nasdaq at a valuation of around $2.6 billion following a merger with special purpose acquisition company ION Acquisition Corp.[23][24] On 23 July 2021, Taboola announced it was acquiring Connexity, a marketing technology company that operates a retail- and e-commerce-focused advertising network, for $800M from Symphony Technology Group. According to the announcement, the company would become Taboola's e-commerce arm following the completion of the acquisition.[25]
Yahoo partnership
On November 28, 2022, Taboola announced that it had signed a 30-year, exclusive commercial agreement with Yahoo!.[26] Under the deal, Taboola will exclusively power native advertising on all of Yahoo's digital properties globally, such as Yahoo! Finance, Yahoo! Sports, Yahoo! News, AOL and Engadget, with Taboola Ads also available to buy through the Yahoo DSP.[27][28] Yahoo is receiving 24.99% of Taboola's total issued and outstanding shares as part of the agreement, as well as one representative on the Taboola Board of Directors.[27]
Corporate affairs
Leadership
Taboola is managed by its CEO and Founder, Adam Singolda. Other key executives are:[29]
Eldad Maniv, President and Chief Operating Officer