Teads today announced an expansion of its partnership with Lumen Research to introduce attention measurement across its connected television offering, bringing eye-tracking-based campaign intelligence to the CTV HomeScreen placement for the first time on a global scale. The announcement, dated May 6, 2026, marks a technical milestone in the ongoing effort to close the measurement gap between digital and television advertising environments.

The two companies have worked together in digital environments for several years. What changes today is the scope: the agreement extends Lumen's attention data into the CTV space and grants Teads exclusive access to Lumen's CTV attention measurement for the HomeScreen placement across the United States, EMEA, APAC, and LATAM. That level of geographic exclusivity is uncommon in the fragmented attention measurement landscape and signals a deepening commitment from both parties.

What the integration actually does

At the centre of the announcement is an industry-first CTV HomeScreen attention prediction model built by Lumen, developed on MediaMento research conducted in partnership with Teads. Lumen uses proprietary real-world eye-tracking data collected from consented participants to create models that predict where people look when watching ads - across different channels, formats, devices, and for how long. According to the press release, Lumen's technology is powered by eye-tracking data from more than 50 countries.

The methodology is predictive, not observational. Rather than requiring every campaign to run alongside a live panel wearing eye-tracking equipment, Lumen's models - trained on real biometric data - score impressions at scale without requiring per-campaign observation. That distinction matters in television environments, where panel-based measurement is both expensive and logistically difficult. The CTV context introduces additional complexity: ads are typically watched on large screens at a distance, often in shared living room settings, and viewer behavior differs substantially from desktop or mobile consumption.

The new model addresses exactly this challenge. It is the first predictive attention model built specifically for CTV HomeScreen advertising outside the United States, based on Phase 1 research that MediaMento Institute completed in June 2025. That earlier research, which Teads published in September 2025, showed that CTV HomeScreen ads achieved a 48% attention rate, outpacing YouTube skippable pre-roll by 16 percentage points. Phase 1 of the MediaMento study ran over 15 hours of live eye-tracking with 100 Smart TV viewers and used brand recall surveys to capture memory formation alongside attention duration.

Today's announcement operationalizes those findings. The research phase produced the foundational data. The Lumen model now applies it at scale, delivering attention predictions for live HomeScreen campaigns through Teads Ad Manager.

The performance numbers behind the announcement

Teads published specific benchmark figures alongside the announcement. According to the company, its CTV HomeScreen campaigns are already delivering approximately 5,300 Attention Per Mille (APM) on average. That figure is 173% higher than outstream video and 114% higher than YouTube. APM measures the total seconds of attention generated per thousand impressions, making it a volume-weighted signal of engagement rather than simply a rate.

These numbers matter for context. In digital environments, attention metrics have been growing in influence throughout 2024 and 2025, with agencies, publishers, and platforms all testing attention-based signals alongside or instead of viewability. But CTV has lagged. The technical challenges involved in measuring viewer attention on large screens in real home environments - without requiring participants to wear hardware - have slowed adoption. The Lumen model, built on in-lab data replicated under naturalistic conditions, attempts to bridge that gap.

The 114% advantage over YouTube is notable because YouTube is frequently used as a benchmark for high-quality video attention. If HomeScreen placements are generating more than double the attentive time per thousand impressions compared to YouTube, that is a significant claim for media planning purposes - though independent validation of these figures has not yet been published.

Why the timing matters for CTV advertisers

Connected television advertising has grown fast and the measurement infrastructure has struggled to keep pace. Teads' CTV revenue crossed $100 million in annual revenue in 2025, growing 55% year over year, and the company now claims access to more than 500 million addressable TVs globally through partnerships with LG, Samsung, Google TV, and others. That scale creates demand for measurement tools that can match it.

The challenge is that a large share of marketers remain uncertain about how to evaluate CTV effectiveness. According to Dentsu's The Brand Reset study cited in the Teads announcement, CTV delivered 3.2% long-term sales lift, approaching linear TV performance. Yet 49% of marketers said they still struggle to assess its effectiveness. That gap between CTV's apparent impact and marketers' ability to verify it is what attention measurement is designed to address.

Lumen is not a newcomer to this problem. The company, founded in 2013, has been extending its eye-tracking-based approach across channels systematically. In March 2026, Lumen partnered with Netflix to deliver attention measurement across CTV, desktop, and mobile in five European markets - the UK, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain. That partnership drew on Lumen's multi-channel eye-tracking dataset and applied machine learning models to generate attention predictions at scale, without requiring per-campaign panel observation. The Teads deal follows a similar structure but focuses specifically on the HomeScreen placement rather than in-stream inventory.

The HomeScreen format is distinct from standard in-stream advertising. It appears when users turn on their smart TV or return to the home interface, creating a moment of high visual attention before content begins. Teads has been running HomeScreen campaigns since 2023 and has reported strong engagement from the format, with brands including Cartier, Nestlé, and Air France among those that have used the placement.

How the measurement is accessed

According to the announcement, attention measurement for CTV HomeScreen is available now globally in Teads Ad Manager for both managed and self-serve campaigns. InStream measurement is expected to follow later in the second quarter of 2026.

The self-serve availability is significant. It means advertisers running campaigns independently through Teads' platform, rather than through a managed service arrangement, can access the same attention intelligence. That lowers the barrier to adoption and makes the measurement accessible to a wider range of advertisers beyond enterprise-level brands.

Teads Ad Manager is the company's unified buying platform, introduced as part of its integration following the $900 million merger with Outbrain in early 2025. The platform supports full-funnel campaign management and connects CTV placements with retargeting across web and mobile. The attention measurement layer adds a new data signal for campaign evaluation within that same environment.

Lumen's role in the broader attention market

Lumen occupies an interesting position in the attention measurement ecosystem. The company has native billing integration with The Trade Desk and has partnered with IAS, DoubleVerify, Snapchat, and now both Netflix and Teads for CTV. Its eye-tracking dataset covers more than 50 countries. DoubleVerify's social attention measurement product with Snapchat, launched in June 2025, also relied on Lumen's eye-tracking data to power impression-level attention metrics.

That breadth makes Lumen's technology foundational infrastructure for much of the attention measurement market rather than a standalone product competing for direct advertiser relationships. The company provides the biometric training data and predictive modeling, while platform partners integrate the outputs into their own measurement workflows.

Nielsen and Adelaide integrated attention metrics in October 2025 through Nielsen's Outcomes Marketplace, combining AU attention scores with Nielsen's reach data to provide advertisers with both volume and quality signals simultaneously. The MRC and IAB finalized attention measurement guidelines in November 2025 after a public comment period running through July of that year, establishing minimum requirements for transparency and comparability across measurement vendors - though those guidelines also explicitly noted that attention should not be used as a direct measure of outcomes.

That industry context is relevant to the Teads-Lumen announcement. The measurement landscape is becoming more standardized, which in turn makes it easier for advertisers to evaluate and compare attention signals across platforms. The availability of attention data in Teads Ad Manager now means marketers can place HomeScreen campaigns alongside standard CTV, digital video, and display activity and receive a consistent attention signal across the mix.

What the executives said

According to the announcement, Caroline Hugonenc, SVP of Data and Insights at Teads, said: "Attention is becoming an increasingly important signal of advertising quality because it helps marketers better understand the relationship between exposure and outcomes. By expanding our CTV attention offering with Lumen, we're giving advertisers stronger signals to assess campaign effectiveness and optimize with greater confidence."

Mike Follett, CEO at Lumen Research, said: "As the streaming space continues to evolve, advertisers need more precise ways to understand how audiences engage with their ads on the big screen. The expansion of our partnership with Teads helps bring that visibility to premium CTV environments and adds a valuable new layer of measurement, empowering advertisers to make more effective media investment decisions."

Why this matters for the marketing community

For media planners and performance marketers, the practical implication is straightforward. CTV HomeScreen inventory on Teads can now be evaluated on attention quality, not just impressions and completion rates. That creates a common language for comparing CTV placements with digital video buys, which have carried attention scores from Lumen and IAS for some time.

The broader CTV measurement picture has been improving steadily. Teads launched deterministic outcome tracking - connecting CTV exposure to site visits, leads, and sales - in October 2025. That tool, CTV Performance, addressed the lower-funnel side of measurement. The Lumen integration today addresses the upper-funnel side: how much attention did the ad generate, and how does that compare across formats and placements?

Together, these tools allow advertisers to evaluate a CTV HomeScreen campaign on both attention quality and downstream outcome. That combination has not been readily available in connected television until recently, and it moves CTV closer to the accountability standards that performance marketers expect from digital environments.

The exclusive geographic scope of the agreement - covering the US, EMEA, APAC, and LATAM - also signals competitive positioning. No other platform will have access to Lumen's CTV HomeScreen attention measurement for this placement type during the exclusivity period. Teads has not disclosed the duration of the exclusivity arrangement.

PPC Land has covered Teads' CTV expansion throughout 2024 and 2025, including the Google TV deal announced in February 2026 that extended the HomeScreen inventory reach to more than 500 million devices globally. The Lumen integration adds a measurement layer on top of that inventory footprint, which has been one of the more substantial connected television buildouts in the advertising technology market over the past two years.

Timeline

Summary

Who: Teads (Nasdaq: TEAD), the omnichannel advertising platform headquartered in New York, in partnership with Lumen Research, the attention technology company founded in 2013. Teads operates with approximately 1,700 employees across 30+ countries and maintains direct partnerships with more than 10,000 publishers and 20,000 advertisers globally.

What: The expansion of an existing partnership to introduce Lumen's attention measurement technology into Teads' CTV offering. Specifically, Teads has gained exclusive access to Lumen's CTV HomeScreen attention prediction model - described as an industry first - built on MediaMento research conducted with Teads. The integration makes Attention Per Mille (APM) data available for HomeScreen campaigns running through Teads Ad Manager, with current campaigns showing approximately 5,300 APM on average, 173% higher than outstream video and 114% higher than YouTube. InStream measurement is expected to follow later in Q2 2026.

When: The announcement was made on May 6, 2026. Attention measurement for CTV HomeScreen is available in Teads Ad Manager globally as of today, for both managed and self-serve campaigns.

Where: The measurement is available globally, covering the United States, EMEA, APAC, and LATAM. Teads holds exclusive rights to Lumen's CTV HomeScreen attention measurement for the HomeScreen placement across these four regions.

Why: Nearly half of marketers - 49% according to Dentsu's The Brand Reset study - say they struggle to assess CTV effectiveness despite the format delivering 3.2% long-term sales lift approaching linear TV. The absence of reliable attention signals for connected television has slowed advertiser confidence in the format even as CTV budgets grow. By bringing Lumen's eye-tracking-based prediction models into the HomeScreen placement, Teads and Lumen are providing a measurement layer that connects premium CTV exposure to a standardized signal of advertising quality, enabling comparison with digital video and supporting budget allocation decisions across omnichannel campaigns.

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