Publishers using Rubicon’s REVV platform will be able to sell their display wares directly to agencies via DDS’ digital campaign manager iDesk. A chosen group of media agencies and premium publishers will try out the integration of the REVV platform and DDS’ Direct Publisher Gateway (DPG), the first solution to emerge from the recently created DDS Labs, in a pilot program.

“Our partnership with DDS and the integration of DPG with the REVV platform will bring publishers a new source of demand for their inventory, while guarding against sales channel conflict and protecting premium publishing brands,” said Rubicon CEO and founder Frank Addante. “By automating each transaction on both the buy and sell side, we get closer to our goal of shifting balance in the ecosystem more equally between buyers and sellers – ultimately lifting revenue for our customers.”

DDS Digital President J.T. Batson previously was executive vice president revenue and global development for Rubicon before he jumped to DDS last summer.

After former CEO and cocreator Adam Bain fled to become president of revenue at Twitter last month, News Corp spun off FAN into MySpace, but Swisher reports that leadership didn’t see any reason to keep it there, especially considering MySpace is going through an overhaul… Wait a second, didn’t that already happen? Or is MySpace simply in perpetual overhaul?

Swisher notes that FAN had a fair deal of suitors, but Rubicon was the “cleanest” option. As I’ve interviewed a few Rubicon execs, I can tell you hygiene over at the publisher platform is of the highest concern — Rubicon employees leave the pleasant scent of fresh-cut roses whenever they depart a room.

UPDATE, Tuesday, 2:48 P.M. EST: “With this ‘acquisition’ Rubicon is trying to play catch up with the other players in the market and it will be at least a year before anyone will know if the deal was even worth it,” commented Rajeev Goel of competing supply-side platform PubMatic, which just introduced a Data Firewall for revealing publisher data leakage. “We see this as a Hail Mary pass by Rubicon and an affirmation that they have failed to technologically innovate internally.”

Integrated within the REVV for publishers platform, RFM will offer campaign creation and creative trafficking across multiple platforms as well as integration with all major third-party ad networks. In addition the mobile offering features real-time reporting, landing page creation and optimization by network, site and zone.

“Mobile inventory is growing quickly as a contributor to our publishers’ overall advertising revenue, so it was imperative we select a partner that could deliver the right technology and services,” said Craig Roah, COO and founder of Rubicon. “We chose to work with mOcean Mobile because they offer the most mature mobile ad serving product on the market, a best-in-class user interface and a team that is staffed with industry veterans.

Dave Gwordz, CEO of mOcean’s parent company, Mojiva, said he believed Rubicon’s mobile offering would bring much-needed ad serving efficiency to the space.

The Rubicon Project channels the revolutionary spirit with its new manifesto “Principles of a REVVolution — The Ad Server Is Dead,” which previews Rubicon’s new publisher-centric digital advertising technology and data platform. This platform will enable publishers to monetize content and data at every tier of inventory across all digital mediums with no geographic limitations.

“Working with companies whose real goal is to access more inventory on behalf of their own advertisers isn’t in the best interest of, and may even be dangerous for, publishers,” said Frank Addante, CEO and founder of Rubicon. “Revising… legacy technology, upgrading it, and tacking on bells and whistles isn’t enough: publishers need technology designed specifically to meet their needs.”

In addition, Rubicon’s updated platform will offer automated demand access, self-serve ad sales, a centralized data platform and pricing and intelligence controls. Yield and channel management are available as well as brand, ad quality and malware protection. All features will apply across the digital media spectrum, including web, mobile, video and email.

The demand-side bourgeoisie was too busy eroding the value of publisher inventory to comment.

The Ad Network Ad Server is compatible with hundreds of interactive advertising networks, including all of the heavy hitters.

“Web sites told us that ad network management was their #1 pain point. So we created and defined the Ad Network Optimization category,” Frank Addante, CEO and founder of the Rubicon Project, said in a release. “Since our launch, Web sites have told us existing ad servers aren’t built to effectively manage ad networks. So today we deliver our new, free, Ad Network Ad Server. These advancements underscore our commitment to optimizing the relationship and revenue between Web sites and ad networks.”

Addante told Adotas that Rubicon is attempting to completely revamp the outmoded ad-server model – a model that hasn’t changed in 10 years. Rubicon has found that only about 20% of inventory is sold directly to Web sites, while 80% just gets farmed out to ad networks.

“I haven’t seen an ad server like ours that deals with ad networks on the yield-management side so that publishers can manage the 80% of ads that go to ad networks,” Addante said.

Rubicon’s Ad Network Ad Server provides consolidated reports for publishers about multiple ad networks in one place.

According to Rubicon, about $27 billion is changing hands industry-wide, and a veritable gold rush has been created in recent years as the media shifted its ad dollars online. From just 15 ad networks seven years ago, more than 300 advertising networks currently exist – ranging from vertical to format-focused to local to international, Frank Addante, CEO and Founder of Rubicon, tells Adotas.

And because ad spending is no longer concentrated on a few select networks, many reporting methods for ad revenue are inadequate and undependable – which prevents publishers from signing on. Currently, 33% of a consumer’s time is spent online, but only 7% of overall ad spending is devoted to interactive advertising.

While more money in ad budgets is being earmarked for online use (5% three years ago and 7% last year) it doesn’t come close to matching to amount of time consumers are spending online, Rubicon reports.

Among Rubicon’s predictions for the future:

• The ad network explosion will continue; the market will see simultaneous consolidation and expansion with net positive growth. International and vertical networks will be big drivers
• Ad servers will be free
• The number of ad networks with grow 30% in 2008 with international, vertical and big media networks being the biggest growth contributors
• Web sites will use multiple networks to effectively monetize their sites
• An abundance of ad space inventory and a new, fresh wave of technology is good news for advertisers: easier buying access, greater visibility, better metrics and more competition result in increased efficiency and more effective conversion

International monetization will gain greater importance as up to 50% of U.S. website visitors come from outside the United States

In other news, Rubicon announced that it has established a Certified Ad Space program. It was created to satisfy ad network and advertiser needs. “The product allows publishers to control ad-quality,” Addante said. “That way they can screen out dancing office girls, punch the monkey ads or ads from competitors. Some of our clients are working with more than 60 networks and it’s a serious challenge keeping up with all of them, especially when they have different criteria for what’s acceptable and what isn’t. With this new product, they can just go to one place to screen all of their networks.”

The program features a 21-point certification checklist and ratings system that has verified more than 10 billion ads and 725 sites to date. (More than 5,000 web sites applied for Rubicon’s private beta of the program).

The Rubicon project launched its first ad network optimization service in October of 2007; since then, more than 4,500 sites have signed up for the service and the company’s “smart matching” technology.

The new Series B round was led by Mayfield Fund with participation from IDG Ventures Asia; Stanford University; University of California Berkeley; Matt Coffin, founder and former CEO of LowerMyBills.com and Clearstone Venture Partners, the company’s Series A investor.  The additional capital will fuel future business growth initiatives including international expansion, strategic acquisitions, research and development and infrastructure required to support the influx of websites signing up for the company’s new ad network optimization service. In past Adotas interviews, CEO Frank Addante said, “the Rubicon Project is solving a serious online advertising problem of efficiency.”

“There is no question this has been a burning problem for websites.  In the twelve weeks since our launch, more than 3,000 websites have signed up and we have optimized more than 4 billion ads across 50 of the top ad networks,” said Frank Addante, CEO and founder. “This has never been done before.  We have created the world’s first free-flow market between ad networks and websites.  Our solution is 4 billion pieces of information smarter today than when we started.  And now with the additional financing, we have everything we need to run full force at attacking this global problem; a killer team, a game-changing product and a deep source of capital to continue investing heavily in the research and development of our smart matching algorithms.”