CANNES, France — Although people talk about serving highly targeting, personalized ads in TV broadcasts in the same way as is becoming possible online, this is unlikely to happen for some years, according to Real Media’s founder.

“There is some automation that can come in from the digital world,” says Simulmedia CEO Dave Morgan. “But the idea of changing the ads at the individual set-top box or changing at the network at the last seconds or hours or days is beyond the capacity of TV and is probably setting the wrong expectations.”

Simulmedia ingests data on how 15 million Americans watch TV, second-by-second, and the performance of more than 700,000 US TV ads to help advertisers gauge their effectiveness, says Morgan.

“For decades, the only data that mattered in television advertising, was the Nielsen rating, the number of gross rating points and sex-age demographics,” he adds. “With 15 years of digital marketing and advertising under our belts, now people want more from the TV world, too.”

Morgan spoke with Beet.TV during the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.  Disclosure:  Simulmedia is the sponsor of Beet.TV’s coverage of the Festival.  Find all our coverage here.