Google has axed its business relationship with ComboTag, the ad buying platform that teamed up with AdBlock Plus, after it was revealed to be working on a rival ad exchange.
Sridhar Ramaswamy, senior VP of ads and commerce at Google, said the company was taken totally by surprise when AdBlock Plus and ComboTag announced on Monday that they would offer an ad exchange that served web ads to ad-blocking consumers.
“It’s an uncomfortable development for us,” Ramaswamy said of the fact that AdBlock Plus was “moving from being an ad-blocking company to being a driver of ads.”
Ramaswamy spoke to reporters about Adblock Plus before he gave a presentation on Wednesday at the Dmexco conference in Cologne, Germany.
Ramaswamy told journalists: “We were just as surprised by the announcement as you. We had no knowledge that this was coming up before the announcement, and we certainly have no relationship with [AdBlock Plus owner] Eyeo.”
The news follows yesterday’s ‘shock announcement’ that AdBlock Plus is to launch its own ad exchange, which it implied that advertising behemoths Google and AppNexus would help facilitate – a move that both parties have denied knowledge of.
ComboTag is an adtech intermediary part-owned by the world’s largest media buying network WPP.
By severing ties with Google, Combo Tag is now removed from the online giant’s ad exchange.