Two new partnerships linking Rubicon Project with IPG’s Cadreon and workflow automation giant Mediaocean are a nod toward more direct programmatic deals for premium inventory in “well-lit environments,” says Rubicon’s VP of Sales for North America.

Matt Greenberg describes Rubicon’s expanded involvement with Cadreon as the latest step in a relationship spanning about three years. Cadreon has been using Rubicon’s non-guaranteed orders marketplace along with its open auction exchange.

Now Cadreon will be accessing “the entire spectrum of the programmatic waterfall, from the unreserved open market to the reserved automated guaranteed space” via Rubicon, according to Greenberg.

Rubicon’s new partnership with Mediaocean aims to help scale automation efforts for the direct buying sector—the largest component of the digital advertising market—through the integration of Rubicon’s Guaranteed Orders product with Mediaocean’s Prisma platform.

“This allows us to access a lot more agencies that are looking for great supply, great partnerships, great publishers for every brand and agency that connects with the Mediaocean platform,” says Greenberg.

The new deals are a far cry from the early days of programmatic buying when it mainly involved remnant inventory.

“As the years have gone along we’ve found publishers and buyers are looking for places to buy premium inventory in well-lit environments,” says Greenberg.