iAd Will Have A New-Look Sales Team: Two More Quattro Guys Leave Apple

As Apple’s new iAd lead — ex-Adobe exec Todd Teresi — reshapes his organization, two more ex-Quattro Wireless execs are leaving the company, sources say. (Apple bought Quattro two years ago to jump-start its iAd advertising division.)

• Steven Rosenblatt (pictured left), who was “Director, iAd Advertising Sales & Strategy” at Apple and SVP of ad sales for Quattro, has already updated his LinkedIn profile to say that he stopped working at Apple this month. On Twitter, he suggests he is already working on his own project. But one industry source says he is already fielding many offers.
• Mike Owen (pictured right), “Senior Manager, iAd” at Apple and former VP of sales at Quattro, is also leaving, sources say. He hasn’t said anything about it on Twitter or LinkedIn yet.

This isn’t particularly surprising: Teresi, who was at Quantcast and Yahoo before Adobe, probably wants to bring in his own team. Apple did not respond to my request for comment.

Bigger issue: How will Apple — whose ads only work on one mobile platform, and still cost more than the competition — make iAds a must-buy? So far, the iAd technology has been impressive, but Apple’s tight control over the platform and its super-premium pricing have helped make iAds a tough sell.

Still, with mobile ads in their infancy, and a potential Apple TV platform on the way — where the biggest chunk of ad money is still locked up, anyway — they’re probably worth Apple’s investment. I expect we’ll be hearing more about iAds this year than last year.

Related: How Apple Can Fix iAd