R&D, Equity & Market Intelligence: The Smarter Way For Strategics To Participate In The Ad Tech Economy
It would be fair to say that ad tech investment remains concentrated and consolidated. From the outside looking in, the same insiders continue to be masters at capturing the lion’s share of the upside.
Celebrity bankers, influencers, and ad tech OGs skillfully leverage influence, networks and capital to build success. Nothing wrong with that, of course. We continue to see it as a great framework for building something new.
New Fund, New Blueprint
Taking these learnings, FPC set out from the start to optimise ad tech investment - deliberately opening up to a broader cohort and investing in undervalued areas.
We chose the road NEVER travelled: a vertical fund investing in pre-seed & seed stage non-US ad tech. And we looked at this untapped opportunity through the analytical lens of seasoned operators.
FPC built one of the largest community investment entities ever conceived. We had no right to - and the odds certainly didn’t favour it - but we did it anyway.
We now have over 250 LPs (and counting) from across our sprawling industry. The idea: to get as many inside the ad tech tent so we all can benefit. The ultimate community fund.
As we reach the business end of Fund 1, we are laser-focused on rewarding that faith and laying the foundations for the next decade of ad tech prosperity that’s open to a larger chunk of the industry.
Giving Corporate Investors Agency Over Their Futures
What we have done with individual investors, we would like to do with corporate investors. Brands, agencies, ad tech and media companies must keep pace in a head-spinning, hyper-evolving sector.
From investing in R&D to reading the industry tea leaves to partnering with bleeding-edge ad tech, staying competitive can be a Herculean task. And as for investing in ad tech, that’s often one board approval too far.
Some manage to do it; most sadly acquiesce to the hyperscalers, outsourcing all commercial and technical autonomy. Nobody gets fired for choosing Google, right? Always a great decision in the very short term - right up until your company becomes a cautionary tale for overdependence and irrelevance.
But it doesn’t need to be thus. What if you could have it all? What if you could access a focused ad tech development team, unbiased market intelligence that actually moves the needle, and exposure to high-growth ad tech businesses?
A New Way To Innovate: What We Are Offering Corporate Investors
Today, FPC is unveiling a new strategy for our corporate partners: packaging the unique capabilities of both FirstPartyCapital and FirstPartyStudio.
Our objective with this initiative is to offer a structured, accessible way for brands, agencies, ad tech, and publishers to navigate an increasingly opaque, self-serving ad tech market. We are doing this through three specific mechanisms:
Technical Execution: Experienced ad tech engineers and product specialists embed directly with the strategic leadership team. Think of it as outsourced R&D, saving on high costs and resource issues.
Market Intelligence: Corporate partners receive structured quarterly briefings on AI, data and infrastructure shifts, global media buying trends, M&A activity, and regulatory developments. This is the edge you need to stay ahead.
Strategic Equity Participation: Partners gain structured access to co-invest alongside FirstPartyCapital in category-leading ad tech companies. This lets you bypass the difficult board-level town halls and the awkward balance-sheet discussions.
Empowering The Strategic
What does this mean for the ambitious, forward-looking companies we are looking to work with? Let’s go through how this will benefit the 4 key strategic players:
Brands
We are focused on in-house brands. Our offering looks to act as a trusted tech partner - from data orchestration to media execution to measurement. Our portfolio of 20+ companies offers a modular tech stack that provides new avenues for innovation for in-house brands looking to deliver performance. We are the ultimate unbiased filter for a fragmented ad tech marketplace.
Agencies
Agencies are under severe commercial pressure (fee compression, decline in traditional revenue lines, etc.). This is hitting indies particularly hard. We are looking to work with savvy agencies eager to build sustainable capabilities. That could be anything from a bespoke data/ad tech solution or maintaining a cutting-edge profitable principal buying offering. FPC deliberately offers a malleable framework to accommodate the wide-ranging requirements of agencies. Also, this cohort is bankrolling much of ad tech’s success - with zero financial upside. By working with FirstPartyStudio, FPC offers the most efficient way to invest in the fund. No difficult chats with the CFO necessary - the perfect onboarding mechanism.
Ad tech
Maintaining a development team is expensive. Integrations globally can be overwhelming and resource-heavy. Understanding what comes next, especially from a non-US perspective, can be daunting. Make your life easier by partnering with FPC on R&D, market intelligence (the global view) and investing in cutting-edge ad tech.
Media
Media is probably the most squeezed in this cohort. Content creators are having to tackle zero traffic and AI macro trends. R&D costs are escalating as publishers explore new growth areas, while traditional revenue declines. Despite the new opportunities, how do you decide what to build and where to allocate R&D budgets? These are existential questions. Our new offering is purposefully built for these scenarios. We offer the full suite of development and market intelligence to help publishers and media companies navigate this new, complicated reality.
We are keen to speak with companies of all shapes and sizes that prioritise innovation and want to stay ahead of the competition. Get in touch if interested: contact@firstpartycapital.com.
Remember: this framework is deliberately flexible. It’s a conversation starter. Every company has its own unique strategic objectives. So, come and talk to us. Outlandish ideas encouraged!
As always, thanks for reading. Have a great ad tech day.