Omar Hamoui: Google’s Coveted Jewel

Tech entrepreneur and innovator Omar Hamoui has successfully merged two great ideas with AdMob. This ad network melded together of the benefits of internet-connected smartphones with Google’s operating system to create a new industry: advertising on mobile devices. With the increasing dependency of people on mobile devices and the rapid demand for new ways of marketing, AdMob potential to become an industry giant is evident.

photo: Eirik Solheim

Because of this, Apple and Google got into a bidding war over AdMob in 2009. The latter won and brought $750 million to Hamoui’s company. Since then, AdMob has placed nearly 200 billion ads in mobile phones and applications downloaded by users of Google’s Android devices. In reply, Apple has launched its own mobile advertising system, the iAd.

Before the success, the bidding wars, and the multi-million dollar deals, Hamoui actually created AdMob to build traffic for his young company. It was a firm that created photo-sharing software for cell phones. He first tried marketing his company through Google ads, but found that it cost too much. Since his application is meant for smartphones, he thought that the best way to market it was directly through mobile devices. But such industry was still unheard of when he initially thought about it.

As a result, Hamoui can be considered as a pioneer in the mobile ad industry. The cost of marketing was shockingly cheaper compared to regular Google ads, too.

Upon seeing how cost-effective this strategy was, Hamoui introduced AdMob to the public market in 2005, attracting the two largest tech companies in the industry.

The wisdom of Omar Hamoui is reflected on the short period (around three years)it took him to create a pioneering company that consequently became the largest player of mobile Web ads. As Google’s coveted jewel, Hamoui is expected to rise up to the challenge and demand of a growing industry in the years to come.