Swivel and Magnite point AI agents at TV ads with no standard

Swivel, a start-up co-founded by people behind the ad server SpringServe, says agents can automate those sales anyway, and the same goes for ads that have to appear in sequence during a programme. Its customers are publishers, the companies selling the ad space. Post-campaign reporting, yield (earning the most from each ad slot), pacing and budgeting each get their own agent, and many publishers adopt only one or two to keep their ad operations undisturbed.

The same week, Magnite told investors that agentic workflows now help it sell ad slots on LG TV home screens, AdExchanger’s roundup reports. Connected TV, meaning streaming on internet-linked sets, is now 53% of its business, by that account.

Part of the answer from Swivel co-founder Joseph Hirsch to a crowded field is the Ad Context Protocol, an open standard from AgenticAdvertising.org for agents that plan and buy media, which AdExchanger notes sits somewhat in opposition to IAB Tech Lab frameworks. One file in it, adagents.json, is a publisher’s list of the agents cleared to sell its ad space.

Swivel and Magnite both work on the sell side. Our media buyers page, updated 23 October, has no tool that mentions connected TV.

The adagents.json file gives a media buyer one concrete check when an agent offers a home-screen slot: whether that publisher has authorised it to sell.