Comscore Partners With Samba TV To Expand In Europe; Needham Says Buy

Comscore said Monday that it has clinched a partnership with Samba TV to expand its cross-platform TV connected footprint across Europe.

Comscore (SCOR) said that the agreement harnesses the companies’ joint strengths in cross-platform measurement intelligence, and lays the groundwork for aggressive European expansion. Samba TV is a cross-screen television data and analytics provider. With this partnership, the companies will roll out international Smart TV measurement capabilities, which will begin in select European markets, they said.

Comscore aims to offer television and digital audience measurement and analytics to help advertisers and media owners better understand the reach and impact of cross-platform advertising. In addition, Comscore will now be able to deploy CTV measurement capabilities to markets around the world, following partnerships announced this year in Italy and Sweden, the media planner said.

“We are delighted to be extending our TV measurement capabilities across Europe,” said Comscore CEO Bill Livek. “As a leader in this area for the US, we have a strategic opportunity to harness our valuable information in partnership with Samba TV and other key players in the region to create an unmatched measurement offer for this vital channel.”

The new Smart TV measurement across linear, CTV, and over-the-top (OTT) streaming, includes ad exposure data at the program. This cross-platform measurement expands Comscore’s footprint for its custom marketing solutions to bolster ad effectiveness studies designed to help clients understand the extent to which their campaigns meet ROI (return on investment) objectives, including purchase behavior.

Comscore and Samba TV said that they plan to expand into additional geographic regions in 2021.

Needham analyst Laura Martin last week assigned a Buy rating on SCOR with a $6 price target (162% upside potential) saying that the stock is undervalued.

“SCOR’s integration of TV and ConnectedTV measurement benefits from the best-kept secret in linear TV – many digital-first companies are buying linear TV,” Martin wrote in a note to investors. “Peloton is the best example in our coverage of a strong brand built on linear TV. Digital advertisers often prefer SCOR’s census-level granularity.”

Martin added that from a valuation point of view, she sees “SCOR as a low cost-way to participate in the shift toward OTT viewing in the US”. (See SCOR stock analysis on TipRanks)

The other analyst, Matthew Thornton at Truist Financial, covering the stock in the past three months has a Hold rating with a $4 price target. With shares down 54% so far this year, the $5 average analyst price target now implies $118 upside potential over the coming year.