Burst Media Corporation
6th February, 2008
Burst Media Corporation
Burst Media Corporation is an online media and technology business founded in 1995. The company delivers advertising campaigns for its customers through a network of approximately 1,850 independent web publishers operating more than 3,800 websites.
Customers have included Adidas, Disney, Delta, Expedia, Ford Motor Company, Monster Worldwide and Orange.
The company was founded by advertising and technology executives who established the business when the
e-commerce phenomenon was building momentum.
It began by representing 50 specialty-content websites and now has an annual turnover of USD 23.5 million (2006). Burst Media has 90 employees throughout its headquarters and other US offices in Albany, New York; Atlanta; Detroit; Chicago; Los Angeles; New York City; and San Francisco, as well as in London.
The organisation is particularly proud of having been awarded its seventh consecutive year of systems certification by media auditor BPA Worldwide and remains the only advertising network with such certification. The company’s mission is to represent the interests of web publishers and improve the value and quality of content online.
Burst Media has advertising servers in Massachusetts, Virginia, Colorado and Amsterdam. Its corporate headquarters are in Burlington, Massachusetts, and it has a wholly-owned subsidiary, BURST Media UK Limited, which it set up in London in 2005.
The company’s core product, housed under its Burst Network brand, offers advertisers targeted access to tens of millions of unique visitors each month. Advertisers are told which sites their advertisements will appear on, from among 3,800 premium specialty-content websites segmented into more than 400 content channels. Advertising fees are calculated on a cost per thousand impressions basis, and campaigns can be highly targeted according to criteria such as: content, behaviour, demographics, geography and time of day, or any combination thereof. Advertising impressions grew from 46.6 billion for 2005 to 56.8 billion in 2006.
Burst Direct, launched in 2006, provides alternative display advertising programmes to web publishers to serve the needs of direct response advertisers seeking large audiences. Burst Direct offers millions of impressions through more than 1,400 member publishers and good working relationships with large internet portal sites.
UHY member firms in the US and UK worked closely as reporting accountants to help bring Burst Media to AIM in 2006 with a USD 118 million market capitalisation on admission.
‘Burst did their own research on accounting firms with AIM experience and found us,’ says Laurence Sacker, a partner with UHY Hacker Young LLP in London. ‘Because we had collaborated with US member UHY LLP on other AIM offerings of US companies, we confirmed to Burst’s management that we were the right team to address their critical reporting requirements in a tight timeframe.’
Mike Zovistoski, a partner with UHY LLP in Albany, New York, headed the US-based engagement team that audited Burst’s financial statements and assisted UHY Hacker Young LLP in the preparation of the reports for AIM investors.
‘We dedicated a team of highly qualified professionals to the Burst engagement to meet the tight deadline,’ says Mike. ‘We exceeded management’s expectations by providing practical advice on numerous issues, particularly international tax matters to help the management team evaluate the best locations for their foreign offices.’
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