Azerion opened four exclusive digital out-of-home networks to programmatic buyers in Belgium on September 10, 2026, routing screens at fuel stations, sports clubs, car parks and Brussels hotels into its Hawk demand-side platform. The move places the company inside a physical-screen category it had until now serviced only as a buying route, and it sets an explicit target: becoming the third-largest retail media network in the country.

In Short

Azerion, a European advertising company, just started selling ad space on real screens in Belgian petrol stations, sports clubs, parking garages and hotels. It already helped brands buy screen ads through its software, but now it owns some of those screens directly, which means it keeps more of the money and controls what runs on them. For advertisers, it is one more place to book outdoor screen campaigns, bundled into themed packages so a car brand or a sports brand can reach shoppers near where they buy.

What Azerion put into the market

The announcement, issued from Brussels and dated 10 September 2026, described a set of captive and exclusive screen networks added to the Hawk platform. According to Azerion, the Hawk DSP already provides access to more than 6,500 connected screens. On top of that base, the company named four networks joining as exclusive supply: DOAA, with 471 screens at gas stations; Expo Sport Media, with 478 screens in sports clubs; Interparking, with 45 screens; and Visit Brussels, with 60 digital kiosks located in several hotels in the Belgian capital.

Those four networks account for 1,054 screens. The distinction the company draws is between screens a buyer can reach through the open programmatic market and screens the seller controls directly. A captive network sits behind a single commercial gatekeeper. Azerion is now that gatekeeper for the four named partners, rather than one buyer among many bidding into an auction that anyone can enter.

The company framed the addition around packaging. According to Azerion, the connected networks enable turnkey themed packages built around Automotive, Sports, Family and Proximity, with advertisers reaching audiences either through a combination of multiple digital out-of-home networks or through a wider media mix. The logic is that a fuel-station screen and a sports-club screen carry different audiences, and grouping them by theme lets a planner buy an intent rather than an inventory list. A car brand buys Automotive; a snack brand buys Family; a brand chasing shoppers near a point of purchase buys Proximity.

Vincent Delmotte, Managing Director of Azerion Belgium, set out the reasoning in the only named comment attached to the release. "Our ambition is twofold. On one hand, we want to strengthen our omnichannel offering by combining the best of DOOH with the power of mobile and digital audio - three perfectly complementary media. On the other hand, we aim to build the country's third-largest network focused on retail media. These initial partnerships are a major milestone, but this is only the beginning of our growth," Delmotte said.

The company placed a figure on its total exclusive footprint in Belgium. According to Azerion, the Belgian operation already holds more than 1,000 exclusive screens, reached either through the Hawk DSP or through Improve Digital, its supply-side platform. Several partner networks remain in the process of integration, which the company said is intended to accelerate deployment in retail media.

The demand-side pattern behind the move

The Belgian screen networks do not stand alone. They extend a supply-accumulation strategy that Azerion has run through its Hawk platform for more than eighteen months, adding formats and inventory sources one deal at a time and routing each into a single buying interface.

The connected-television leg came first. In January 2025, Hawk expanded its European CTV reach through an integration with the smartclip supply-side platform, opening RTL AdAlliance's video portfolio to programmatic buyers. The data layer followed a year later. On January 29, 2026, Azerion integrated Global Data Resources into Hawk DSP, enabling geo-demographic targeting across 13 European markets without cookies or device identifiers. Because the GDR segments target geographic clusters rather than individuals, that integration was positioned as suited to channels including digital out-of-home, connected TV, audio, mobile, display and gaming.

Audio supply arrived through a run of publisher deals. In May 2026, Azerion took over the sale of digital audio advertising across L'Equipe's roughly fifteen French sports podcasts, acting as the exclusive programmatic monetisation partner while the publisher continued direct sales in parallel. Later that month, Azerion routed the Spotify Ad Exchange directly into Hawk, giving buyers a direct pathway to Spotify audio, video, display and podcast inventory without an intermediary connection. The company described that step as part of a wider effort to consolidate premium global supply inside a single buying platform.

Broadcast video widened the same month. On June 22, 2026, Channel 4 named Hawk as one of five programmatic partners opening its video-on-demand inventory, alongside Amazon DSP, FreeWheel, PubMatic and Yahoo DSP. The Belgian DOOH networks slot into that sequence as the physical-screen entry, sitting beside CTV, audio, video and display inside the same platform. Delmotte's phrase about combining DOOH with mobile and digital audio describes exactly the portfolio Azerion has been assembling: distinct formats sold through one interface, with the pitch resting on the breadth of the mix rather than any single channel.

The economics of that consolidation showed up in the company's most recent numbers. Azerion posted its strongest first-quarter profitability on record in 2026, with revenue from continuing operations reaching 117.4 million euros, up 1.6% from 115.5 million euros a year earlier, and adjusted EBITDA climbing 11.9%. Average digital ads sold per month reached 13.6 billion in the first quarter, up 18.3% from 11.5 billion a year prior, while operating expenses for continuing operations fell from 28.1 million euros to 22.1 million euros. The company trades on Euronext Amsterdam under the ticker AZRN, was founded in 2014, and reported revenue of 551 million euros for 2024.

Where DOOH sits in the programmatic market

The category Azerion is entering has spent several years moving from a niche private-marketplace tactic toward a mainstream line item, though the pace varies sharply by operator and geography. Programmatic DOOH, or pDOOH, refers specifically to out-of-home inventory bought through automated, auction-based channels rather than a negotiated insertion order. A screen can be digital without being programmatically transactable, and much outdoor inventory still trades the old way.

The protocol-level foundations arrived earlier this decade. In November 2022, IAB Tech Lab added the dooh and qty objects to OpenRTB, closing a gap that had forced platforms to rely on custom, non-interoperable extensions. The OpenOOH Venue Taxonomy, which classifies screen locations so buyers can target by environment, published its first version in 2020 and has since moved through revisions.

Adoption figures show how uneven the shift remains. Programmatic DOOH reached 10.5% of JCDecaux's total digital revenue in the first quarter of 2026, against far higher shares in individual markets. Germany already trades a larger proportion of its digital out-of-home revenue programmatically than any other JCDecaux market, at 42.7% versus a 12.3% group average. Buyer intent points upward. VIOOH's 2026 State of the Nation report found the channel is forecast to appear in nearly half of all campaigns globally within 18 months, up from a 34% share over the preceding period, with recent pDOOH buyers anticipating an average 44% uplift in investment over the next 18 months. That survey drew on 1,050 advertisers and agencies across the US, UK, France and the Middle East.

The category has also been extending into environments where screen inventory exists but had not previously been integrated into a major supply-side platform. In May 2026, VIOOH added Abode Media's residential building screens to its programmatic ecosystem, opening more than 250 interior screens across over 230 premium residential buildings. Roadside, transit, retail, office, place-based streaming and mobility had all been brought under programmatic platforms within the preceding year. Azerion's Belgian set - gas stations, sports clubs, car parks, hotels - fits the same expansion into specific venue types with distinct audiences.

The retail media angle

Delmotte's second stated ambition, building the country's third-largest network focused on retail media, points the Belgian networks at a category larger than outdoor advertising alone. Retail media is advertising sold against a retailer's first-party shopper data, most often as sponsored listings on a retailer's own site or app, or through offsite placements on inventory the retailer's data can target. The physical-store portion of that category, sometimes traded as in-store retail media, covers advertising sold inside physical shops using retailer data, with screens, audio and smart carts among the formats.

The connection between DOOH and retail media runs through location and proximity. A screen at a fuel station or inside a hotel is not a retailer's own website, but it sits close to points of purchase and can be targeted using audience and location signals. Azerion's own data groundwork feeds directly into this. The GDR integration was built to support geo-demographic targeting across channels including DOOH without relying on individual identifiers, which is the kind of privacy-compatible signal that retail media buyers increasingly require as the industry moves away from cookies and device IDs.

Omdia projected in September 2025 that retail media would take about 20% of global advertising revenue by 2030, exceeding 300 billion dollars. That projected scale is one reason a platform assembling supply across formats would name retail media as its destination rather than treating DOOH as a standalone play. Whether Azerion reaches the third-largest position it named will depend on how the partner networks still in integration compare against operators already established in the Belgian retail media market, a comparison the announcement did not draw.

What the announcement did not specify

The release named four networks and a total screen count but left several operational details open. It did not state pricing for the themed packages, nor the measurement standard applied to the DOOH inventory. It did not identify which partner networks remain in the integration process, nor a timeline for completing them. The figure of more than 1,000 exclusive screens covers supply reached through both Hawk and Improve Digital, but the release did not break down how the total splits between the demand-side and supply-side routes.

The distinction matters to a buyer weighing the offer. A screen reached through Improve Digital, the supply-side platform, is inventory Azerion sells; a screen reached through Hawk, the demand-side platform, is inventory Azerion buys against on a client's behalf. The company presented both under a single exclusive-footprint number, which describes reach without describing the commercial relationship attached to each screen.

Why this matters for the marketing community

For media planners working with European inventory, the Belgian networks add a concrete set of physical-screen options to a platform that already carries CTV, audio, video and display. The practical value of consolidation is workflow: a buyer who can activate DOOH, audio and mobile from one interface avoids stitching campaigns across separate systems, which is the efficiency argument Azerion has made across every supply integration since the smartclip deal in early 2025.

The move also reflects a wider pattern in which supply-side and demand-side platforms have been racing to bring previously unautomated screen environments into programmatic reach. The venue types Azerion named, fuel stations and sports clubs and car parks, carry defined audiences that suit themed buying, and the packaging into Automotive, Sports, Family and Proximity is an attempt to sell that audience intent directly rather than asking planners to assemble it screen by screen. For advertisers, more captive supply inside a major platform means more addressable outdoor inventory, though the absence of published pricing and measurement detail leaves open how the offer compares on cost and accountability against established Belgian operators. The retail media framing signals where the company expects the value to concentrate, in inventory positioned near the point of purchase and targeted with privacy-compatible location data rather than individual tracking.

Timeline

Summary

Who: Azerion Belgium, the local operation of the Amsterdam-headquartered advertising platform Azerion Group N.V., which trades on Euronext Amsterdam under the ticker AZRN. Vincent Delmotte, Managing Director of Azerion Belgium, provided the only named comment. The named partner networks are DOAA, Expo Sport Media, Interparking and Visit Brussels.

What: The launch of four exclusive and captive digital out-of-home networks into the Hawk demand-side platform, totalling 1,054 screens across gas stations, sports clubs, car parks and Brussels hotels, sold as themed packages built around Automotive, Sports, Family and Proximity. Azerion stated it already holds more than 1,000 exclusive screens in Belgium across its Hawk DSP and Improve Digital supply-side platform.

When: Announced from Brussels on September 10, 2026, with several partner networks still in the process of integration.

Where: Belgium, with the digital kiosks located in hotels in Brussels and the broader networks distributed across the country.

Why: According to Azerion, the goal is twofold: to strengthen an omnichannel offering combining DOOH with mobile and digital audio, and to build the country's third-largest network focused on retail media, positioning outdoor screen inventory near points of purchase within a market Omdia projects will exceed 300 billion dollars globally by 2030.