DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV): History, Ownership, Mission, How It Works & Makes Money

As digital advertising budgets balloon, how do you defintely know your spend isn't wasted on fraud or low-quality content? DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) is the essential gatekeeper in this $600+ billion global ad market, operating a platform that verifies media quality and performance for the world's largest brands.

The company's Trailing Twelve Months revenue reached approximately $733.32 million as of Q3 2025, with full-year revenue growth expected to be around 14%, underscoring its critical role in a complex ecosystem where Connected TV (CTV) Media Transactions Measured surged by 30% in Q3 alone. You need to understand this company because its $1.69 billion market capitalization is built on the simple, urgent need for trust and transparency in digital media.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) History

You're looking for the foundation of DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV), and the story is one of adapting to the chaotic, evolving digital ad ecosystem. The company started with a simple, yet critical, mission: bring trust and transparency to digital advertising. It has since grown from a verification tool to a full-fledged media effectiveness platform, proven by its expected full-year 2025 revenue growth of approximately 14%.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Founding Timeline

Year established

DoubleVerify was founded in 2008, just as the digital advertising market was starting to boom and the need for independent verification of ad quality became acute.

Original location

The company is headquartered in New York City, New York, a central hub for media and advertising technology.

Founding team members

The company was co-founded by Oren Netzer, alongside Roberto Bortolotti and Alex Liverant, who set out to tackle the nascent problems of ad fraud and viewability.

Initial capital/funding

While the total funding before its IPO reached $396 million, the initial institutional capital began with a Series A round in May 2009, which raised $3.5 million. This early backing was crucial for building the proprietary technology that would become the core of its ad verification service.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Evolution Milestones

The company's growth wasn't a straight line; it was a series of strategic moves to expand from basic verification to comprehensive media quality and performance measurement. This table tracks the most significant shifts that shaped the business model.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Transformative Moments

The true inflection points for DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. came from anticipating the market's need for deeper ad insights, not just basic fraud checks. Honestly, the shift from 'did it run?' to 'did it work?' is the whole story.

The company's transformative trajectory is marked by three key strategic moves:

• The Move to Performance Measurement: The 2020 launch of DV Authentic Attention® and Custom Contextual solutions was a pivot. It allowed advertisers to measure not just viewability, but the actual exposure and engagement of an ad, translating quality into campaign performance.
• The Public Market Validation: The 2021 IPO was a massive vote of confidence, giving the company the currency to become a consolidator in the ad-tech space. This led to a trailing twelve-month revenue of $733 million as of September 30, 2025.
• The AI-Driven Ad Effectiveness Platform: The 2023 acquisition of Scibids and the 2025 acquisition of Rockerbox, which contributed to the launch of the DV Media AdVantage Platform (DV MAP), fundamentally changed the business. This platform uses AI to drive superior outcomes, shifting the company from a pure-play verification vendor to a holistic media effectiveness partner. You can see the impact of this scale in the Q3 2025 financial results: total revenue hit $188.6 million, up 11% year-over-year, with an adjusted EBITDA of $65.9 million.

This focus on AI and performance is defintely what's driving the growth in key areas, like Media Transactions Measured (MTM) for Connected TV (CTV), which increased by 30% in Q3 2025. If you want a deeper dive into the numbers that back this up, you should check out Breaking Down DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Financial Health: Key Insights for Investors.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Ownership Structure

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) is controlled primarily by institutional investors, including a significant stake held by its former private equity owner, Providence Equity Partners L.L.C., which continues to influence the company's strategic direction. This structure, common for a post-IPO company, means that while the company is publicly traded, a few major funds hold the majority of the voting power, a key factor for any investor or business strategist to defintely consider.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Current Status

DoubleVerify is a publicly traded company, listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) under the ticker symbol DV. As of the end of the third quarter of 2025, the company was classified as a 'Large accelerated filer' by the SEC. Its total shares outstanding stood at approximately 163.6 million as of July 29, 2025.

The company's financial health remains strong in a challenging digital ad market, with full-year 2025 revenue projected to be approximately $818 million, representing about 14% year-over-year growth. Plus, the projected Adjusted EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization) margin for the full year 2025 is approximately 33%, highlighting the business model's scalability. For a deeper dive into the numbers, you should check out Breaking Down DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Financial Health: Key Insights for Investors.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Ownership Breakdown

The ownership structure is heavily weighted toward institutional investors, a typical scenario for a technology company that completed its Initial Public Offering (IPO) in 2021. This concentration of ownership means that the decisions of a few large funds can significantly impact the stock price and corporate governance.

Here's the quick math for the general ownership split as of late 2025, based on public filings:

What this estimate hides is the influence of key players. Providence Equity Partners L.L.C., a private equity firm, remains a dominant force, holding approximately 11.35% of the company as of mid-November 2025. Other major institutional holders include BlackRock, Inc. with about 12.07% and Vanguard Group Inc. with approximately 8.95%.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Leadership

The company is steered by a seasoned management team with deep experience in the digital advertising and ad-tech space, which is crucial for navigating the constant platform changes and regulatory shifts in the industry.

• Mark Zagorski: Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Appointed in July 2020, his total yearly compensation was approximately $1.08 million in 2025.
• Nicola Allais: Chief Financial Officer (CFO). He has been in the role since November 2017, providing financial stability and continuity.
• Steve Mougis: Global Chief Commercial Officer. He is set to assume this role on January 1, 2026, transitioning from Chief Growth Officer, a key commercial leadership evolution announced in September 2025.
• Nisim Tal: Chief Technology Officer (CTO). He oversees global technology, software engineering, and the critical AI-driven solutions the company is known for.
• Alex Valle: Chief Product Officer (CPO). Responsible for aligning the product roadmap with customer needs and market opportunities.

The average tenure for the management team is around 5.4 years, showing a stable and experienced group at the helm, which is a significant advantage in this volatile sector.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Mission and Values

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) stands as the independent arbiter of quality in digital advertising, driven by a core purpose to build trust and transparency across the entire media ecosystem. Their cultural DNA is built on a set of values that directly translate into the development of AI-powered solutions that protect brand equity and maximize advertiser performance.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. Core Purpose

You're investing in a company whose mission goes beyond just counting clicks; they are committed to fixing the plumbing of the internet's ad-supported model. This focus on integrity is what gives their financial model its durability, which is why the full-year 2025 revenue growth outlook was raised to approximately 15%, with an adjusted EBITDA margin guidance of approximately 32%.

Official mission statement

The company's mission is fundamentally about preserving a fair and healthy digital media exchange. They commit to creating effective, transparent ad transactions that make the digital advertising ecosystem stronger, safer, and more secure. This means being impactful for brands, sustainable for publishers, and respectful of consumer choice. It's a mission to build a better advertising industry, honestly.

• Preserve a free, ad-supported internet.
• Ensure ad transactions are effective and transparent.
• Make the digital ecosystem stronger and safer.
• Build clarity and confidence in digital investment.

Vision statement

DoubleVerify's vision is centered on becoming the definitive media effectiveness platform, moving beyond just verification to encompass optimization and outcomes. The near-term focus is a clear strategic 'North Star': to grow revenue from high-growth areas like social, Connected TV (CTV), and AI Verification solutions from under 30% of total revenue today to roughly 50% in the medium term. This is a massive shift, and it's why they launched the DV Media AdVantage Platform (MAP).

• Transition from media protection to performance driving.
• Target social, CTV, and AI for 50% of medium-term revenue.
• Transform fragmented data into actionable intelligence.
• Be the independent, trusted, transparent guide for marketers.

For a deeper dive into how this strategic vision impacts their balance sheet, check out Breaking Down DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Financial Health: Key Insights for Investors.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. slogan/tagline

The company's most consistent and powerful tagline reflects their core value proposition in a complex market. It's a simple promise that cuts through the noise.

• We Build Trust and Transparency Across The Digital Ad Ecosystem.

Their core values, often summarized by the acronym PACT, demonstrate how they execute this mission:

• Passion: We are driven to build a better industry.
• Accountability: We do what's right (the right way).
• Collaboration: We deliver better together.
• Trailblazing: We invent a way.

This commitment to innovation, for example, is defintely paying off: the new AI-powered DV Authentic AdVantage solution, which combines verification and optimization, closed nearly $8 million in expected annual contract value (ACV) shortly after its launch in 2025, showing real-world traction for their 'Trailblazing' value.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) How It Works

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) is the essential software platform for digital media measurement and analytics, acting as the independent arbiter of quality and performance for global advertisers. The company's technology verifies that an ad is seen by a real person, in a safe and suitable environment, and has the opportunity to drive a measurable outcome, which is defintely crucial in today's complex digital ecosystem.

You're looking to make every dollar of your digital ad spend count, so DoubleVerify provides the data to stop spending on fraud and low-quality inventory before it happens, plus gives you the tools to optimize for attention and performance. The core business is split into three revenue streams: Activation (pre-bid), Measurement (post-bid), and Supply-Side, with Q3 2025 total revenue hitting $188.6 million.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Product/Service Portfolio

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Operational Framework

The company's operations center on real-time data processing and AI-driven decision-making, all housed within the DV Pinnacle platform. This system processes billions of data points daily to classify and score digital ad inventory before, during, and after an impression occurs.

Here's the quick math: DV's full-year 2025 revenue growth is guided at approximately 14%, with a projected Adjusted EBITDA margin of 33%, showing strong operating leverage as the platform scales. The majority of this growth comes from existing customers expanding their use of DV solutions, plus new advertiser wins contributed about a third of the revenue growth through the first nine months of 2025.

Key operational drivers include:

• AI-Powered Value Chain: Leveraging AI for automation in verification and launching new offerings like DV AI Verification (AI SlopStopper) to combat generative AI-driven fraud and agent interactions.
• Platform Expansion: The launch of the Advantage Platform broadened the focus from just verification to include optimization and performance measurement, integrating the capabilities from the March 2025 acquisition of Rockerbox.
• Walled Garden Integration: Deep integrations with major platforms like Meta and Google allow for verification within those environments, which is crucial since Meta alone contributes about $40 million in annual revenue.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc.'s Strategic Advantages

DV's market success rests on its independence and its deep, long-term investment in proprietary technology. They are an independent verification platform, which is the cornerstone of trust for major global brands.

This is a high-margin business, honestly. The company maintains gross margins over 80%, which is a clear indicator of a powerful, scalable software model.

The core advantages that sustain market leadership are:

• Independent Standard: Holding Media Rating Council (MRC) accreditations for key metrics like the DV Authentic Ad, which allows their data to be used as a single source of truth for ad quality.
• R&D Moat: A massive investment in product differentiation, spending approximately $210 million more on R&D than the closest competitor between 2023 and 2025 to date, creating unique offerings in social and streaming.
• High Customer Retention: The net revenue retention rate stands at a strong 112%, meaning existing customers are not only staying but are also increasing their spend year over year.
• Financial Resilience: A debt-free balance sheet provides flexibility for continued strategic investments and acquisitions, a significant advantage over competitors who may be more constrained.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) How It Makes Money

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. generates revenue by providing a software platform that acts as a critical, independent third-party verifier for digital advertising, ensuring that ads are viewable, free of fraud, and displayed in brand-safe environments across the open web, social media, and Connected TV (CTV). The company primarily operates on a usage-based model, charging advertisers a fee per thousand media transactions measured (MTM) or for pre-bid activation that prevents poor ad placements before they even happen.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. Revenue Breakdown

Looking at the third quarter of 2025 (Q3 2025) results, which are the most recent, you can see a clear picture of where the money comes from. Total revenue for the quarter hit $188.6 million, an 11% increase year-over-year.

The Activation segment, which is the largest, focuses on pre-bid solutions, meaning the technology is used to filter out fraudulent or unsafe inventory before an ad is purchased. This is the company's core growth engine, and it grew 10% year-over-year to $106.7 million in Q3 2025. The Measurement segment, which verifies ad quality after the ad runs, is a stable, high-margin business that brought in $63.8 million. Honestly, the fastest-growing segment is Supply-Side, which grew 27% to $18.1 million, as publishers and platforms use the tools to prove their inventory quality to advertisers.

Business Economics

The financial model is fundamentally strong because it's a software-as-a-service (SaaS) model tied to the massive and growing digital advertising spend. The key is that the service is non-discretionary; advertisers must use verification to protect their budgets.

• Pricing Model: The primary revenue mechanism is the Measured Transaction Fee (MTF), a fixed fee charged per thousand Media Transactions Measured (MTM). This means as digital ad volume grows, DoubleVerify's revenue grows, even if ad prices stay flat.
• High Retention: The company maintains a gross revenue retention rate of over 95% with its advertiser clients, showing the stickiness of its verification tools. Once a brand integrates the platform, they defintely don't want to turn it off.
• Platform Dependence: A significant portion of revenue comes from large platforms; for instance, the partnership with Meta Platforms, Inc. contributes about $40 million annually. This concentration is a strength but also a risk if a platform changes its policies.
• New Product Upside: New offerings like the DV Authentic AdVantage solution are driving incremental revenue, closing approximately $8 million in annual contract value (ACV) in the early stages of its rollout. This shows a clear path for upselling existing clients.

You can learn more about the company's long-term strategy here: Mission Statement, Vision, & Core Values of DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV).

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. Financial Performance

The company's financial health is characterized by high margins and a clean balance sheet, which is what you want to see in a scaled software business. Here's the quick math on Q3 2025 performance:

• Gross Margin: The gross margin on revenue less cost of sales remains very high at 82%. This indicates a highly scalable software product with low variable costs relative to the revenue generated.
• Adjusted EBITDA and Margins: Adjusted EBITDA for Q3 2025 was $65.9 million, translating to a strong 35% margin. For the full year 2025, management raised its adjusted EBITDA margin guidance to approximately 33%, highlighting continued operating leverage.
• Net Income: Net income for Q3 2025 was $10.2 million, while non-GAAP earnings per share (EPS) was $0.22. Note that the GAAP net income is lower due to factors like increased operating costs and stock-based compensation.
• Balance Sheet: The balance sheet is exceptionally strong, reporting approximately $201 million in cash and cash equivalents as of the end of Q3 2025, with no long-term debt. This gives them significant flexibility for strategic acquisitions or share buybacks.
• Growth Outlook: Despite some softness in the retail vertical, the company expects full-year 2025 revenue growth of approximately 14%. What this estimate hides is the potential upside from new products in high-growth areas like Connected TV (CTV) and AI-powered verification.

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Market Position & Future Outlook

DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. is positioned as the dominant leader in the media quality and ad fraud verification space, but its future hinges on successfully transitioning from core protection to performance and outcomes across high-growth channels. The company expects full-year 2025 revenue growth of approximately 14% and has raised its adjusted EBITDA margin guidance to approximately 33%, showing a strong, scalable business model even as macro headwinds slow near-term growth.

Competitive Landscape

In the ad verification sector, DoubleVerify operates as one half of a clear duopoly with Integral Ad Science, though it holds a commanding lead in the ad fraud detection segment specifically. You can see the market share breakdown below, which clearly shows DV's scale advantage.

Opportunities & Challenges

The digital advertising ecosystem is moving fast, so DV is leaning hard into AI and new channels. The Q3 2025 results, with $188.6 million in revenue, were solid but missed analyst expectations, which is why mapping these opportunities and risks is defintely crucial right now.

Industry Position

DV is the established independent standard for media quality, moving beyond just verification (Did my ad run?) to full-funnel performance (Did my ad work?). This is a big shift.

• Dominance in Core Verification: The company's massive 66.72% market share in ad fraud detection gives it a structural advantage in data volume and network effects.
• Strategic Platform Shift: The new Media Advantage Platform (MAP) is central, aiming to unify verification, optimization, and attribution to capture a larger share of the advertiser's budget.
• High-Growth Channel Focus: DV is actively diversifying revenue streams, targeting a medium-term goal of generating over 50% of revenue from social, CTV, and AI products.
• Operational Efficiency: Raising the full-year 2025 adjusted EBITDA margin guidance to 33% demonstrates the inherent operating leverage and efficiency gains from AI-driven automation.

For a deeper dive into who is betting on this trajectory, check out Exploring DoubleVerify Holdings, Inc. (DV) Investor Profile: Who's Buying and Why?