Several major television broadcasters have partnered with OpenAP on a new industry initiative aimed at creating a standardized way for advertisers to connect television ad exposure with business outcomes across linear TV and streaming video.
A+E Global Media, AMC Global Media, Fox, Hallmark Media, Comcast’s NBC Universal, Paramount, Scripps Networks, Televisa-Univision and Warner Bros Discovery are participating in the effort, which will begin with a pilot involving select advertisers, agencies and attribution providers. The companies said the goal is to reduce fragmentation in TV ad buying while giving marketers a more consistent framework for measuring whether campaigns drive tangible results.
OpenAP said the initiative will focus on helping advertisers use first-party conversion data, such as store visits, coupon requests or other customer actions, to evaluate the effectiveness of campaigns across premium video publishers. Initial results from the pilot are expected to be shared at major industry events over the next year.
The effort comes as TV companies seek to move more ad dollars toward data-driven video products and outcome-based measurement, a theme that has surfaced during this year’s upfront presentations. NBC Universal, Fox and Amazon were among the companies emphasizing outcomes as advertisers look for alternatives to broad impression-based metrics.
“Advertisers face growing pressure to prove performance while navigating increasing complexity,” said Ryan Gould, the President of U.S. Advertising Sales, Go to Market at Warner Bros Discovery and Chairman of OpenAP’s Board of Directors. “This cross-publisher initiative simplifies that challenge by making premium TV easier to connect, measure and invest in strategic audiences across data-driven video.”
As part of the initiative, OpenAP will introduce a Unified Conversion API for TV, described as a single on-ramp that allows advertisers to connect first-party outcome data with exposure data from participating publishers. OpenAP said the capability will use its shared identity framework to create more consistent conversion signals across linear and streaming environments.
The company will also roll out new campaign workflows designed to help buyers commit spending across publishers and platforms. Future phases will support agentic workflow interactions, allowing buy-side tools and agents to use attribution signals from the conversion API to further automate and optimize video investment.
OpenAP CEO David Levy said premium video needs “its own intelligent operating layer” to better compete with walled gardens, adding that a standardized integration point could help advertisers measure performance more easily while giving publishers a stronger framework to grow investment.
Lisa Herdman, the Chief Enterprise Integration Officer at RPA, said fragmentation remains the biggest barrier to scaling audience-based buying in television. She said OpenAP’s infrastructure could help unify data, activation and outcomes without disrupting the direct relationships advertisers and publishers rely on.
OpenAP was originally created by 21st Century Fox, Viacom (now Paramount) and WarnerMedia to establish standards for advanced advertising.
