Report: DoubleVerify invests in FirstParty Capital amid ad tech shifts

Uncertainty continues to shape the ad tech landscape, driving established players to seek innovation through strategic investments. According to sources speaking to Digiday, ad verification leader DoubleVerify has reportedly invested $1 million in FirstParty Capital, a European venture capital firm specializing in early-stage ad tech startups.

FirstParty Capital focuses on nurturing companies that enhance automation and infrastructure within the ad tech and mar-tech sectors. The firm’s portfolio includes Bedrock, Good-Loop, Lumen Research, and LightBox, with a particular emphasis on bridging market gaps between Europe and North America. The impact of privacy laws such as GDPR has accelerated the decline of third-party cookies in Europe, making investment in data-driven startups more critical than ever.

Although DoubleVerify has not officially confirmed the investment, its latest move aligns with broader industry trends. The company previously acquired AI-driven ad tech firm Scibids for $125 million, signaling a strategic shift toward activation and advanced data-driven solutions. Analysts suggest this investment could indicate a larger trend where verification companies pivot toward leveraging proprietary data to strengthen their market position.

Ciarán O’Kane, a partner at FirstParty Capital, described this development as a sign of “the LUMAscape collapsing on itself.” He emphasized that in a rapidly evolving ecosystem dominated by AI and large language models, proprietary first-party data is the key differentiator. “The only moat is data,” O’Kane stated, predicting that the latter half of the decade will see the rise of ‘super signal aggregators’—companies leveraging first-party data to train AI models that optimize ad performance.

Interestingly, market speculation previously linked DoubleVerify to a potential acquisition of FirstParty Capital’s portfolio company Lumen Research, though sources close to the discussions have downplayed the likelihood of such a deal. The investment also follows recent moves by The Trade Desk, which recently announced plans to acquire Sincera, a company that aggregates publisher data to assess inventory quality. Sincera was an early beneficiary of The Trade Desk’s venture fund, TD7, which has also backed startups like Chalice AI, an emerging player in optimizing large language models for page-level analysis.