Strike Social Adds Lawrence Chu to Board; Announces Agreement With USC Big Data and Systems Researcher, Dr. Arif Ansari

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 7, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Strike Social, the largest TrueView Advertising Platform, announced today the addition of Lawrence Chu to the company's Board of Directors, as well as the initiation of a development agreement with Dr. Arif Ansari, Head of Data Science Research at the University of Southern California.

According to Strike Co-Founder and CEO, Patrick McKenna, "We've been working with these gentlemen for months and we're delighted to make these key relationships official.  The additions of Larry Chu and Dr. Ansari add significant depth to our team of advisors.  Few individuals are as seasoned as Mr. Chu at stewarding early-stage companies to massive success.  We are fortunate that Larry believes in what we are doing and will be supporting and guiding our efforts as we continue to rapidly expand our business.  In addition to Larry Chu, Dr. Ansari brings considerable scientific expertise to our efforts. He is essential in the development of our pioneering algorithms that provide brands and agencies with unparalleled insight into what's happening with their YouTube marketing efforts."

About Lawrence Chu: Larry is a technology industry veteran and leads the West Coast Technology Mergers and Acquisitions practice for Goodwin Procter. He also serves as an active advisor and investor to a number of emerging companies based in Silicon Valley and abroad.  In his practice, Larry represents domestic and foreign companies, both public and private, in a broad range of technology verticals. He is particularly experienced in the AdTech space where he recently represented acquirers such as Amobee in its acquisitions of Adjitsu, Gradient X, Kontera and Adconion, as well as targets such as Flurry in its sale to Yahoo!, and Topsy in its sale to Apple.  His wide experience in M&A and corporate finance has led to his involvement in over 125 announced transactions with an aggregate deal value of over $90 billion.  According to Mr. Chu:

"I'm very excited to be involved with Strike Social and help further accelerate its already rapid growth.  What's incredible to me is how effective the platform the team there has built.   Efficiency and accuracy are necessities for marketing campaigns to win on today's complicated digital media battlefield and more brands are recognizing each day that Strike Social is the killer app on both these fronts in the video space, with weapons such as its real-time Contagious Index."

About Dr. Ansari: Professor Arif Ansari is an expert in the area of data mining, business intelligence, data warehousing, and intelligent systems and technologies. Professor Ansari received the Marshall School of Business's Golden Apple Award in 2006.  A Big Data and Advanced Predictive Analytics visionary, he has built advanced engines for challenging problems including his real-time Contagious Index^TM for Strike Social.  Dr. Ansari is currently the CEO of Intuition Intelligence, Inc., providing custom-built Advanced Analytical Engines for the Retail, Sports & Health Science sectors.  Dr. Ansari holds a Ph.D. from USC as well as multiple Masters degrees in intelligent systems from USC & IIT – Madras. Dr. Ansari teaches Data & Advanced Analytics at USC Marshall School of Business. Prior consulting clients include SAS, TerraData, Wipro and others.  Dr. Ansari also holds multiple US and International patents.  With respect to the new agreement, Dr. Ansari says:

"I'm delighted to be working closely with the Strike Social team to build advanced analytics for the Video Ad Market.  Strike Social's platform is powered by several of our algorithms, all of which help brands understand the relationship between paid, earned and owned media; it provides a true "Wow!" effect for customers. The end result of our work is that video advertising industry marketers can use our tools to focus on creating campaigns that yield excellent ROI instead of studying charts and designing A/B experiments."

About Strike Social: Strike Social was founded in March 2013 by a team of YouTube experts, tech geeks, marketing execs and media buying gurus who came together to build the largest third-party TrueView advertising platform. Its technology gives brands and agencies the tools they need to be successful on YouTube, and achieves hyper-targeted TrueView advertising campaigns to increase performance and lower costs.

Strike Social's platform launched in August 2013 and was promptly featured on TechCrunch. A month later, the Silicon Valley Business Journal labeled it the 7th-fastest rising startup on AngelList. More recently, Forbes detailed how "Strike Social can maximize your advertising return on YouTube." Strike Social has worked with some of the largest brands and agencies in the world including 20th Century Fox, Dodge, Starcom MediaVest, XBOX and Walmart.

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SOURCE Strike Social