Marcus Aurelius once said, “He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe.” Imagine if he could see a Roku streaming stick.
Yesterday, Innovid announced that LG Ad Solutions joined its Harmony initiative. Innovid Harmony brings together publishers, platforms, and agencies to streamline connections between CTV supply and demand to create a more direct and efficient supply path (SPO!). In doing so, ad dollars go toward working media instead of getting lost to the dreaded “adtech tax.” It also should increase publisher revenue and delivers more transparency. For Harmony, Innovid is solely an ad server and does not buy or sell any media.
From the initiative, Harmony offers three products: Harmony Direct, for percentage-free, guaranteed media buys; Harmony Instant Optimization, which uses AI to prioritize top-performing ads based on Innovid’s data; and Harmony Frequency, a, you guessed it, frequency management solution for CTV. In addition to LG, partners included Assembly, CMI Media Group, PMG, and Roku (the latter were announced when Harmony launched earlier this year).
Innovid says the work with LG Ad Solutions will “optimize advertising at the infrastructure level.”
Why This Matters:
CTV advertising has grown quickly, bringing familiar digital ad challenges, especially in supply path optimization. Key SPO issues include inefficiencies that drive up costs, ad fraud, and general quality challenges, all driven by platform intermediaries and fragmentation. Additionally, many CTV platforms act as walled gardens, making auditing, accountability, and even a basic understanding of where ads are running challenging.
In response, the industry is moving toward direct connections to reduce inefficiencies, with SSPs and agency partnerships favoring more streamlined and transparent paths to supply. Platforms like FreeWheel, Magnite, and other SSPs have made upgrades to make inventory more accessible and to create more direct access. While not an SSP, Innovid Harmony aligns with this trend of supporting fewer hops and intermediaries.
Experts React:
Earlier this year, when Innovid launched Harmony, Bill Duggan, Group EVP at the ANA, praised the initiative, noting that there are a “staggering $22 billion in potential efficiency gains in the advertising supply path, with 29% of the original ad dollar going to DSP and SSP costs. Much of today’s supply chain is not linear and has multiple hops, which introduces additional costs and risks that can impact everything from brand safety to the viewing experience. When it comes to efficient and effective buying, advertisers need to prioritize control and transparency – and for that, directness matters.”
Our Take:
Adtech often suffers from a “too many cooks” issue, and CTV, where billions of dollars are flowing, can feel particularly opaque. The category has an opportunity to offer advertisers greater control and confidence by establishing more transparent, direct paths for campaigns. Harmony is a good neutral example (neither DSP nor SSP) of an initiative nudging the space forward.
