Adtech Leader Rubicon Project Advances in Europe with Interxion

Rubicon Project's platform automates buying and selling for the global online advertising industry. With only milliseconds to send an ad to a consumer's device, the company's infrastructure needs to be as close as possible to its markets. In Europe, that means colocation at Interxion's Frankfurt and Amsterdam campuses.

The challenge

Ever thought about the commercial game that plays out behind the scenes when you load a web page and see an ad?

For more than 60,000 apps and over a million websites worldwide, billions of times every day, this is what happens: in the milliseconds between a page being requested and loaded, the Rubicon Project platform receives a signal that prompts an auction among buyers for ad space on the screen. The winning bidder's creative is then retrieved by the platform and sent to the device. If it doesn't happen in time — if the end user scrolls past the ad slot before the ad has been delivered — it's all for nothing.

"This is a global business, and we don't know where the next page load is going to come from. So we need to be close to the user, both virtually and physically," says Tom Kershaw, Rubicon Project's CTO.

In Europe, having had a presence in the adtech heartland of Amsterdam for several years, the company decided to add a second location to:

• Enhance the resilience of its architecture
• Further reduce latency
• Take advantage of growth opportunities in the region

The Solution

Rubicon Project settled on Germany — Europe's largest media market — and specifically Frankfurt, the interconnection hub for the whole country. Colocating here enables compliance with Germany's strict data privacy rules, and puts Rubicon Project in a good position to serve expanding markets in Central and Eastern Europe.

The company chose Interxion as its colocation partner. The fact that Interxion Frankfurt is the most densely connected data-centre campus in Europe was a key factor. Equally important was Interxion's insight into the adtech industry, as Matthew Breedlove, VP of Technical and Data Operations at Rubicon Project, explains:

"The most significant element of our relationship is Interxion's ability to understand our business and the speed at which this industry runs," he says. "We don't have months and years to develop. We have weeks. And we need a partner that understands how to move in that same timeline."

The success of the Frankfurt-based relationship led Rubicon Project to switch its Amsterdam colocation to Interxion — making Interxion Rubicon Project's sole colocation provider in Europe.

"Interxion has been a critical partner for us," says Kershaw. "I think the combination of physical location and great service, as well as speed and connectivity in the infrastructure, makes our business perform better [and] makes our customers happier."

Why choose Interxion?

Interxion enables fast-growth platform providers to improve the delivery of their services to customers. Operating in the heart of Europe’s largest data and connectivity hubs, we offer solutions that enable you to expand and scale as you grow. We work hard to understand your business strategy and growth plans, ensuring we have available capacity as your business needs change.