Three key themes from Prebid Ascent Germany: Developers Conference

This fall, I joined a few members of the Raptive team in Cologne for the Prebid Ascent Developers Conference. Prebid is a unique organization where industry giants work together to shape the future of ad tech. And while many industry consortiums are all talk with no follow through, Prebid is different.

While we did plenty of networking, our role at the conference wasn’t passive; we were there to contribute, build, and help guide solutions that matter to creators. Much of the technology that powers the open web comes out of Prebid. Conferences like this one spark innovations that directly influence how creators and publishers earn a living on the open web.

What brought us to the Prebid Ascent Developers Conference

At Raptive, we’re passionate about solid partnerships as a path forward in an increasingly complex digital world. At the Prebid Developers Conference, we partnered with our friends at Magnite on a presentation to help demystify the open source technology that helps power the open web: Prebid Server. 

Prebid Server was developed to speed up pages for readers while maintaining strong monetization for creators. Because Magnite and Raptive both have deep experience running Prebid Server, we laid out common pitfalls teams run into when getting started. Our ultimate goal was to engage more people with the Prebid community, because the more people who use Prebid Server, the better it gets for everyone.

Outside of conversations about using and improving Prebid Server, three main themes emerged from the conference: mobile, audio and agents. 

Three key themes from Prebid Ascent Germany

Monetizing mobile

Mobile is hard to monetize for a variety of reasons, one being that mobile devices lack the computing firepower of desktops. Prebid Server is special because it can help reduce the amount of work your phone needs to do to serve ads. Our extensive experience with Prebid Server helps us increase your revenue without compromising performance. 

Monetizing audio

In the nascent realm of audio advertising, Prebid is simplifying programmatic monetization. Most audio content is still monetized with direct deals that can be time consuming to negotiate. In a world where platforms can turn articles into “podcasts” for zero marginal cost, this needs to change. With support from us and other companies, Prebid is developing tools to monetize audio with less overhead, making sure creators don’t get left behind.

Monetizing…agents?

Outside of mobile and audio, the focus was on agents. We’re in the early days of agents and there’s still argument over what exactly an “agent” is. The best examples we have so far are the browsers released by Perplexity and OpenAI—Comet and Atlas—which can perform actions on behalf of users.

Paul Farrow from Microsoft highlighted key questions arising in a world of agents: Who gives consent when the browser is acting on its own? Who is being advertised to? The answers aren’t yet clear, nor do we know how agentic privacy and monetization will work given the patchwork of local, regional, and global regulations.

What comes next

What is clear is that the discussions that take place at conferences like this one have a direct impact on the future of content. By being part of the conversation, we ensure creators and publishers have a seat at the table.

And the work doesn’t end when the conference wraps; our team sits on committees in Prebid and IAB Tech Lab, and we’ll continue to work with Google, Microsoft, and more to push for the world we want to see: one where open standards thrive and you can build strong, sustainable businesses on a faster, healthier open web.