WATCH: Why Direct Execution and AI Will Define the Future of TV

At AdExchanger’s Programmatic I/O in New York, Tatari CEO Philip Inghelbrecht sat down for a wide-ranging conversation on where TV advertising is headed. Philip outlined Tatari’s vision for a TV ecosystem that is outcome-driven, AI-enhanced, and powered by direct supply paths rather than legacy digital infrastructure.

Here are the biggest takeaways from the stage.

Technology Built for ALL of TV

Philip began by grounding the audience in what makes Tatari unique: technology for TV advertising, spanning both CTV and linear. While much of the programmatic world focuses exclusively on streaming, Tatari is still the only solution that fully unifies CTV with traditional cable and broadcast — which still represents 50–60% of TV viewing consumption.

Tatari works with the full spectrum of advertisers, from DTC newcomers to brands like Starlink, Figma, Terminix, and even Super Bowl advertisers. Regardless of size or spend, these brands rely on Tatari to manage the entire TV journey from planning and buying, to creative optimization and measurement.

Outcome Measurement: Moving TV Beyond Audience Metrics

At Programmatic I/O, an event rooted in performance and data, Philip underscored Tatari’s early decision to measure TV the way digital marketers expect: through outcomes, not just audience reach.

Unlike traditional TV measurement built around GRPs, Tatari pioneered next-day, outcome-based reporting across both CTV and linear, tied directly to actions such as:

• Site visits

• App installs

• Purchases

• Offline conversions

This is powered by combining:

1. Brands’ first-party event data, and

2. Impression-level exposure data

The result? TV can be executed more like digital marketing. For a room full of programmatic buyers, it was a clear signal: TV no longer has to operate on a delay.

The New TV Playbook: Why Direct Supply Beats Programmatic Pathways

A major theme at this year’s Programmatic I/O was supply path optimization — and Philip’s POV was refreshingly direct (pun intended).

Tatari has long believed that direct media execution is the superior path for CTV. And the reasons resonated with the Programmatic I/O crowd:

1. Less Waste, More Working Media

Eliminating DSPs, SSPs, and layers of intermediaries cuts the “ad tech tax,” which can consume up to 100% of media spend in certain programmatic chains.

2. Guaranteed Quality

Buying directly from premium publishers means:

• Zero fraud

• Built-in brand safety

• Clarity on inventory placement

3. The Reality of CTV Supply

Tatari’s data shows that 90–91% of CTV impressions come from just 10 publishers. If supply is that consolidated, why use web-style programmatic systems?

Tatari instead integrates directly into publisher ad servers, offering:

• Cleaner paths

• More transparency

• Higher-performing campaigns

Philip noted that while competitors are now adopting this language, true SPO isn’t a PMP discount or a reskinned header-bidding workflow; it’s the direct path Tatari has championed since day one.

AI Will Define the Future of TV Operations

While many Programmatic I/O panels avoided the topic of AI, Philip leaned in, highlighting its potential to fundamentally reshape TV planning and buying.

AI-Powered Planning

Tatari uses machine learning layered on eight years and billions of dollars of outcome data, enabling the platform to build TV plans in seconds; with better accuracy and performance than humans can achieve manually.

This applies to both CTV and linear, where machines can process tens of thousands of placements and outcomes in ways human planners never could.

AI-Driven Buying (and the Decline of the DSP)

Running a DSP requires millions of price auctions per minute and are often expensive, inefficient, and increasingly unnecessary.

Tatari envisions a shift toward:

• Identifying the pool of available impressions

• Using first-party data

• Applying AI to match the best impression to the best brand

• Bypassing price auctions entirely

This new model provides cheaper, faster, more efficient results and sets the stage for a more modern TV ecosystem.

Vault: Built for Privacy, Designed for TV

Philip also touched on Vault, Tatari’s privacy and identity company, launched to address two industry needs:

1. Lead on Privacy

Especially for FinTech and healthcare advertisers, Vault processes all data in a fully anonymized, privacy-safe way, enabling Tatari to eliminate IP address usage entirely.

2. Measure Across Publishers

Unlike most clean rooms that operate in publisher silos, Vault enables cross-publisher measurement, delivering clearer attribution and stronger optimization.

The Future of TV is Now

From the Programmatic I/O stage, Philip made one thing clear:
TV advertising is entering a new era defined by outcomes, AI, and direct supply connections.

And Tatari is building the infrastructure to lead that shift.

The next wave of TV is coming fast — smarter planning, cleaner supply paths, stronger measurement, and AI that actually improves performance. If you want to get ahead of it, let’s talk!