Forbes recently released its annual list of the world’s most innovative companies, and we’re excited to announce that Nielsen has ranked 30th.
Since our founding more than 90 years ago, innovation has played a key role in our efforts to measure the behaviors of consumers in more than 100 countries around the world. And in today’s rapidly evolving marketplace—where new devices are changing both media and shopping habits—innovation has never been more important to serve our clients.
Over the last few years, we’ve developed and launched a suite of tools to measure the total audience across the new media landscape. Through artificial intelligence technology, ratings that measure across platforms, and partnerships with digital content providers, we’re empowering media companies and advertisers to plan, activate and measure content and campaigns.
We also recently unveiled the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) industry’s first truly open, cloud-based and highly scalable technology—the Nielsen Connected System. The new platform is designed to allow data to seamlessly flow in and out of the system, allowing our clients to work with third parties of their choice; and many of these collaborations are already happening through the Nielsen Connected Partner Program.
In addition, Nielsen Innovate, our Tel Aviv-based startup incubator, has been an important innovation investment. Through the program, we’ve funded 19 tech startups since 2014.
Forbes ranked the companies on the list by their innovation premium: the difference between their market capitalization and the net present value of cash flows from existing businesses (based on a proprietary algorithm from Credit Suisse HOLT). The difference between them is the bonus given by equity investors on the educated hunch that the company will continue to come up with profitable new growth.
