Mitsunaga Kikuchi

When most people think about data companies, they think about Big Tech: companies like Meta and Google, which made their billions by acquiring and deploying user information. But the fact is, in 2026, virtually every sufficiently large business is a data company, no matter what its ostensible function is. And some of these data companies,…

According to cynics, the death of programmatic advertising has finally arrived. This would suggest a major paradigm shift, were it not for one thing: namely, the fact that people have been predicting the death of programmatic advertising for years. They've been wrong before and, perhaps unsurprisingly, they're wrong now. But that doesn't mean things aren't…

Across industries, from finance to healthcare, the term “black box” universally denotes complex models shrouded in mystery. Marketing is no exception, with artificial intelligence-fueled campaigns that can fly fast and on auto-pilot while largely remaining an enigma to their human users. The fact is, many AI-based ad-buying tools aren’t known for their transparency. It may…

In baseball, player success is measured in statistics like batting average, on-base percentage and runs batted in. Advertising has its own metrics for success (as many as in baseball), from leads generated to total engagement, cost per acquisition to cost per thousand impressions. However, one that should be retired like a pitcher with a shaky…