The Trade Desk and Acxiom expand UID2 partnership with AI-powered measurement platform

The Trade Desk and Acxiom have expanded their collaboration with the launch of True Intelligence, a new measurement platform designed to connect digital and connected TV (CTV) advertising with real-world business outcomes.

The initiative builds on Acxiom’s role as a closed operator for The Trade Desk’s Unified ID 2.0 (UID2) since 2021. UID2, an open-source identity framework, uses encrypted first-party data to help advertisers reach audiences across the open internet. The new solution integrates UID2 with The Trade Desk’s Kokai AI ad platform, establishing a live feedback loop between ad impressions and transaction data provided by Acxiom.

Traditional attribution methods often struggle to capture the full customer journey, particularly when it comes to offline purchases or incremental results. True Intelligence is intended to close this gap by connecting log-level ad exposure with both online and offline sales. Acxiom’s global president, Sean Muzzy, noted that advertisers are increasingly seeking incrementality metrics that demonstrate whether campaigns are truly driving new customers and outcomes rather than merely influencing existing demand.

The approach bears similarities to measurement products within closed ecosystems such as Amazon’s Marketing Cloud, where advertisers can analyze incrementality inside a single platform. Unlike these walled garden solutions, True Intelligence is designed for use across the open internet, including CTV, and is built on Snowflake to maintain neutrality. The Trade Desk’s Chief Revenue Officer Jed Dederick emphasized that advertisers will have access to detailed log-level data and can combine it with their own CRM or first-party datasets, moving away from the black-box models common among large tech platforms.

At the core of True Intelligence is the integration of Acxiom’s Real ID, UID2, and the Kokai platform. By applying machine learning, the system analyzes ad exposure, conversion activity, creative performance, and contextual factors such as media type and frequency. This allows marketers to identify high-value audiences, refine targeting, and adapt creative strategies while campaigns are still running. In a pilot with a major consumer packaged goods brand, the system matched UID2 identifiers to Real ID in 85 percent of cases, enabling cross-channel measurement at scale.

Data exchange within True Intelligence takes place inside privacy-focused clean room environments to ensure compliance with evolving data protection rules. This allows advertisers to analyze audience-level performance without exposing personally identifiable information.