How AppLovin Scared Google

In 2023, Google ad executives noticed something alarming about one aspect of their business. Once-red hot revenue growth from selling ads promoting mobile apps, a business worth double-digit billions of dollars for Google, had slowed, a former employee said. When staffers discussed what was going on, they agreed a small ad tech firm called AppLovin was starting to nip at Google’s heels.

One of a handful of small companies that run ads that pop up inside games like Zynga’s Words with Friends, AppLovin had gained market share partly by ignoring the privacy constraints that Google followed. These include industry standards against tracking consumers across the Web using their internet protocol addresses, data that identifies people’s devices. That meant AppLovin offered advertisers the ability to target consumers in a way that Google couldn’t.