Taboola

Taboola connects advertisers with relevant and personalized content via its AI-powered content discovery platform in order to drive brand engagement. Taboola also offers a news discovery service (Taboola News) that allows personalized news feeds to be directly incorporated into mobile devices. The fiirm has introduced a number of enhancements to its solutions including an AI-powered homepage personalization tool , SmartBid Dimensions , an automated ad bidding technology, and a Generative AI AdMaker . In February 2023, in partnership with TIME, the firm entered the ecommerce space with the launch of ‘ Taboola Turnkey Commerce ’, which allows premium publishers to create trustworthy content that helps readers make informed purchase decisions.

A competitive edge Taboola has over its peers such as Outbrain, is the large number of partnerships it has established with leading media publishers (9,000 by September 2021) including Bloomberg, USA Today, and NBC, which are exclusive long-term partners. In addition, in November 2021 the firm upgraded its automated ad bidding system with the launch of ‘SmartBid dimensions’ which uses granular customer readership data to provide unique insights on customer intent. 

Key customers and partnerships

By November 2021, Taboola’s content discovery platform was reportedly used by more than 14,000 advertisers who provide content to 500+ million daily active users. Taboola News discovery service was offered by leading mobile device manufacturers in at least 80 countries as of July 2021. 

The firm has entered into a number of partnerships to enhance its product offerings including with Microsoft to launch a new ad bidding service as well as with PMC to bring personalized content to leading entertainment websites in its portfolio which include Rolling Stone, Billboard and Variety. Taboola has also executed on a number of acquisitions including Connexivity, one of the largest ecommerce advertising media platforms on the open web, which it acquired in In July 2021 for USD 800 million. Taboola expects the incorporation of the ecommerce data provided by Connexivity and the upselling opportunities created to drive higher yields for Taboola’s publishers and advertisers. In May 2022, Taboola acquired Gravity R&D , a developer of an ad personalization engine to further enhance its customization capabilities. 

In November 2022, Yahoo acquired a 25% stake in Taboola, becoming its largest shareholder. The firm deepened its relationship with yahoo and entered into a 30-year partnership to become the exclusive native advertising partner for all of Yahoo’s digital properties and is expected to generate ~USD 1 billion in annual revenue.

Funding and financials

Taboola was listed on the NASDAQ in June 2021 via a special purpose acquisition corporation (SPAC) ION Acquisition Corp, where it raised USD 526 million. The listing attracted investments from Blackrock and Federate Kaufmann Fund while the firm was valued at USD 2.6 billion. For FY 2022, the firm achieved a revenue of USD 1.4 billion (1.6% YoY growth). On the back of robust Q2 2023 performance, the firm revised the lower bound of its full-year 2023E guidance upwards for all metrics. The company expected revenue to range from USD 1.438 billion to USD 1.469 billion, which is a YoY growth of 2.7% to 4.9%. Additionally, the adjusted EBITDA range was revised to USD 73 million to USD 80 million. To drive growth, the company planned to increase investment in its Yahoo partnership and other key segments, like performance advertising, ecommerce, and header bidding, and is optimistic that its investments will start to yield returns in FY2024E, generating ~USD 200 million in Adjusted EBITDA and USD 100 million in free cash flow.