Box Number 5

After three and a half years since the acquisition of AdGear by Samsung Electronics, yesterday was my last day at Samsung Ads. I founded AdGear with Yves and Vlad in 2010, but we started working on the ideas and the project as early as 2008. In total, I’ve spent 11 years working on what eventually became AdGear and Samsung Ads, and 15 years in and around advertising technology. That’s about a third of my life so far, which is not at all insignificant, so walking out after all that time last night in the rain with a single box of some of my belongings was a somewhat surreal way to cap it all off.

In putting my box together, I got to rummage through an old filing cabinet in which I kept my various notebooks throughout the years, a small collection of letters (the real analog kind), and various other nostalgia inducing tidbits of months and years past. In the end I triaged most of everything to the shredder bin and walked out with just these surviving items:

1. A small collection of (mostly Marvel) comic books which I brought in to frame and hang up on the walls of my first real office at AdGear.
2. Three print panels of iconic LaPresse front pages marking various newsworthy events of the 20th century (specifically from 1930, 1945, and 1980 marking the inauguration of the Montreal Jacques Cartier bridge, the end of World War II, and the assassination of John Lennon, respectively), a gift that adorned our office walls, from our friends at LaPresse, after we launched the native ads functionality making up their revolutionary digital tablet edition LaPresse+
3. Various handwritten letters from my friends and family. In this day and age, these are exceedingly rare.
4. A checklist of TODOs and a handwritten speech I authored a few years ago when I had the honour of officiating a friend’s wedding.
5. A bag containing a raspberry pi, a couple of arduinos, a breadboard, and various wires and sensors, from back when we had the aspirations to try to put targeted ads on absolutely everything :)
6. A wonderful photo album that the AdGear team recently gifted to the founders with pictures of the team throughout the years.
7. An old green tie which I probably wore to a Holiday party once.

Today, I’m very proud to see Samsung Ads continue to grow and invest into its business and leverage its Montreal-based tech and operations teams. The initial vision of using TV viewership data to build better TV advertising products for brands is playing out in full swing, and I’m excited to watch the team continue to grow and deliver on that vision.

It’s been a heck of a ride. I’m indebted to all of the great people that have helped build out the ship amid the sometimes turbulent seas. We worked hard and the challenges were very real, but the privilege of getting to ride it out with some of the best and brightest far outshines all of the adversity that we faced and sweat that we shed amidst the elements. And we had some really great times together, too.

As I lookout toward what’s next, I plan to take advantage of some of my free time by spending it with my young family, getting back into learning more vigorously, and working on my physical health a little before — to borrow my favourite analogy again — I cast off the lines and venture to sea once more.