Search marketing firm Adlux collapses with debts of more than $3.5 million
Australian search marketing provider Adlux has collapsed with debts of more than $3.5 million.
The company, which formed in 2009 and had a presence in the US, South America and Asia, offered services including display ad placement, search solutions as well as customised toolbars for websites. Joubert Insolvency has been appointed as the liquidator.
Among the creditors is online travel wholesaler Excite Holidays, whose joint founder George Papaioannou is a major shareholder and founder of Adlux, according to Excite’s website.
Excite’s other co-founder, Nicholas Stavropoulos was the chief executive of Adlux from August 2009 to June this year.
According to a list of creditors, Excite is owed $842,735. The largest creditor is a company called GNE Services Trust which operates out of the same Bondi Junction office suite as Excite and is owed $1.2 million.
Two other firms at the same address – Gen Y Pty and GNE Racing – are owed $154,072 and $7,160 respectively.
Other creditors named in documents include Kinected which is owed $788,553, US-based Nami Media which is owed almost $400,000 while the Australian Tax Office is due an “unknown” amount by Adlux.
Directors of Adlux declined to comment on the insolvency, and questions around the list of creditors, whilst Randall Joubert had not returned calls at the time of publication.
Adlux says on its website that the company provides “sophisticated and intelligent advertising solutions” through the Adlux Search Network and Adlux Media Network. It promises “innovative, effective advertising solutions and a source of PPC online advertising products to advertisers and agencies throughout Australasia, North America, Latin America and Europe.
In January the company announced it was powering the Coles website search bar, with Stavropoulos saying at the time the company was Australia’s “number one search network”.
In the release he said: “Big name Australian brands, such as Coles, are dealing with us because of our premium client base, the premium services we provide, and the premium advertisers we work with.
“Whilst this is great news for Coles, the real winners in this deal are Adlux’s existing clients. They are set to benefit directly from increased levels of high quality search traffic boosting the effectiveness and performance of their campaigns. We already offer significant reach and this partnership will help drive those results even further.”
Steve Jones
Disclosure: Mumbrella is listed as a creditor of Adlux.
you mean clients didn’t want to continue buying “premium” bot traffic from them?? Surprised they lasted as long as they did.
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sounds like a duck, looks like a duck…
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I happen to love Nicholas Stavropoulos and Evan Belafas… ‘s racing car.
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This is good news for the search marketing world. That company was a disaster.
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Kinected ? as in the shop that reps MediaMath ?
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Kinected – as in Gary Hardwick’s firm? Ouch.
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first brandscreen now adlux. can we expect more carnage in the programmatic scene?
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I’ve been keeping track of the Australian digital media trading landscape since 2010 through this ‘MediaScape’ – http://www.mediascope.com.au/d.....comparison
As you’ll see our market has evolved enormously in a very short amount of time with overseas and homegrown media tech businesses all bustling for their share.
LB raises an interesting point. Have we seen the tipping point where we’ll see further consolidation through a deflating media tech bubble?
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Denise – ‘Deflating media tech bubble’ – really?? Seems like things are going pretty well!
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Alex – It does make you stop and think how many media tech companies are out there and how many can survive? First glance all looks good and companies are growing, but when you peel some companies back, you see they are either losing money or trying to push more people into their company to “grow”. How many “tech” and “re-marketing” companies can we possibly maintain.
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National Sales manager has just left the travel company excite. does that say anything?
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How can a company own a race car but watch the company it self go down hill ?
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