Mobile third-party ad-serving network Ringleader Digital has partnered with interactive digital advertising technologies and services company EyeWonder Inc. to develop rich media and video advertising.

The agreement provides a platform to address the emerging market for mobile advertising in rich media applications and services, specifically with an eye toward smartphones. Apple's iPhone, Research In Motion's BlackBerry, HTC's T-Mobile G1 with Google and other smartphones are giving users access to rich media, which is creating new avenues to reach mobile consumers.

"Over the last few months, we've seen the iPhone and the App Store, the BlackBerry Storm, the G1 and other advanced devices make an obvious advancement in the mobile industry, and so there's a need for more rich media mobile ad units," said Bob Walczak, CEO of Ringleader Digital, New York.

"We're teaming up with EyeWonder, forming a strong strategic relationship, to create standard ad format units that brands we work with will be able to leverage," he said. "EyeWonder has been getting a lot of demand requirements from their brands and agencies looking to get into mobile, so they gain distribution for their campaigns.

Ringleader integrated with EyeWonder's buy-side tool so that EyeWonder can track the rich media mobile campaigns through that same system, the way it does online.

If a brand is running online and mobile campaigns, now EyeWonder can manage both through the same dashboard.

Demand for rich media continues to expand rapidly, with industry analysis firm Screen Digest projecting that the market will reach $2.79 billion by 2012.

The mobile video market also continues to grow, with Nielsen Co. reporting 24 percent annual growth in subscriptions to mobile video, increasing to 16.4 million customers in the third quarter of 2008.

Additionally, the growing ubiquity of mobile handsets with multimedia support is central to driving rich media demand.

It is no surprise, then, that advertisers are turning their attention to rich media to reach mobile consumers.

"Adding EyeWonder to our third-party ad-serving network is a logical step for us, because they're a best-in-breed company for rich media development," Mr. Walczak said. "We're certainly going to work with them on drop-downs, animated ads, video ads and other formats that fit this specific [smartphone] environment, everything from applications to the mobile Web.

"Ringleader's focus in the marketplace is to enable an ad model that is interoperable with online campaigns," he said. "Rather than online or mobile, we're thinking of it as digital.

"The market is evolving, and units in mobile need to be more advanced as environments become more advanced, and thus more impactful for a brand's bottom line."

Ringleader Digital's third-party ad serving network enables integration with new technologies and applications that will continue to enhance mobile advertising, which in turn enables brands and agencies to extend their ads to mobile while also maintaining a dashboard view of both mobile and online campaigns.

Also, Ringleader claims that its device-agnostic network was the first third-party mobile ad service to specifically target ads by device functionality.

EyeWonder is an interactive digital advertising provider, extending the reach of online rich media and interactive video ads to mobile device displays.

Through its technology, products and services, EyeWonder helps advertisers, advertising agencies and content publishers to create, build, deliver, track and optimize interactive advertising campaigns.

"We said, ?Let's go with the industry experts in content and media creation, EyeWonder, and let them do what they do best," Mr. Walczak said. "We're deploying ads through the third-party ad server model to help mobile grow as online grew."