Adverty enters next phase of growth and global expansion by focusing founder Niklas Bakos on product strategy and promoting Tobias Knutsson to CEO

Adverty AB (publ) announces the promotion of Tobias Knutsson to CEO, alongside the appointment of Thorbjörn Warin as Chief Supply Officer, with founder Niklas Bakos to focus on product strategy and development, as the leading in-game advertising specialist enters its next phase of growth and global expansion.

Adverty, the leading in-game platform for advertisers, agencies and game developers, prepares for the next phase of growth in the commercialization of its seamless in-game brand advertising platform, by expanding the management team to accelerate developments within product and sales.

Tobias Knutsson, currently Chief Commercial Officer, brings years of leadership, strategic sales and extensive business development experience to the role as CEO of Adverty. Previously Chief Commercial Officer at DanAds, and CEO at Strossle, where he was responsible for revenue optimisation at the fast-growing media tech company, he comments: “Adverty is taking the next step in its journey towards unlocking previously unreachable audiences and comprehensive monetization streams. I am beyond excited and can’t wait for this next stage on our journey and taking the reins as CEO.”

Adverty’s founder Niklas Bakos will now be able to focus on key areas within product strategy and development, as the company readies itself for further acceleration and expansion globally. He says: “We are at an exciting junction both industry and company wise and as a leader within the in-game advertising space we continue to push our boundaries to make sure what we build today is what the industry needs both now and tomorrow. My emphasized focus will allow me as a product-centric founder to fully work on short to long term product related strategies and developments – not only the soul of the company, but fundamental to our future success.

“We have been very impressed by Tobias’ qualities, leadership skills and his contribution to the management of the company, beyond his role in sales”, says Joachim Roos, Chairman of the Board of Directors. “This change of responsibilities is a great opportunity to avoid any disruption to the current business, while setting the scene for further growth, and for the company to mature.”

To accelerate further growth of its games portfolio, Adverty is hiring Thorbjörn Warin as Chief Supply Officer. Based in Finland, Warin was previously VP of Publishing EMEA at US based adtech company AdColony, where he worked closely with game publishers in the region. With over 15 years of experience from senior roles within the mobile industry, Warin is a mentor with the first European game development accelerator and advisor to one of India’s leading mobile F2P game developers, Cympl. He served as CMO of Helsinki-based game developer Grand Cru, and, prior to that, as Head of Marketing at Berlin-based game studio, Wooga. Warin will oversee growth on the supply side, by engaging more game developers to become part of Adverty’s seamless in-game advertising portfolio, and lead a diverse team of business developers across Adverty’s offices in London, Madrid and St Petersburg.

Warin comments: “I am excited to bring Adverty’s unique, seamless and unobtrusive ad offering to more game developers across the globe and help both smaller and larger publishers maximize their ad monetisation. Gaming is slowly becoming the next big thing for brands – Verizon is set to create a virtual Super Bowl stadium in Fortnite this year – and game developers have used traditional ad solutions for years already. Now we just need to connect the dots and introduce them to the new way of monetizing through brand advertising.”

Adverty is also expanding the team further with the hire of Olga Kazanski, based out of Russia, who will join Warin’s team as Director of Business Development. A strategic-minded specialist in gaming, she joins from ad tech company Mintegral, where she focused on publisher business development.

The news follows Adverty’s recent multi-patent grants in the US and partnership announcements with InMobi and Verizon Media, which enables the media giant’s wide range of partners and advertisers access to Adverty’s in-game ad solutions, in order to reach wider audiences within gaming.

Adverty is currently in the process of strengthening its demand-side team with a replacement to the Chief Commercial Officer position.