Adblock Plus made nearly €18 million in profit in 2019

The Cologne-based company Eyeo, which operates Adblock Plus, made a hefty profit in the 2019 financial year.

A lot of money can be earned with ad blockers on websites. This is proven by the start-up Eyeo, which generated a profit of 17.9 million euros in the 2019 financial year. The start-up has been in the black since 2015. However, this year's profit is lower than in the previous year because the company took out a loan. "Overall, development in the financial year was very satisfactory," says the annual report, which has only just been published. The Cologne-based company was able to increase its turnover by 30 percent compared to the previous year to 47 million euros.

Eyeo was founded in 2011 and offers Adblock Plus, a well-known ad blocker. The start-up also earns money by allowing paying advertising customers to bypass the filter. Eyeo is hoping for a similarly good result in the 2020 financial year. A new partnership with Microsoft, which has integrated the ad blocker into its "Edge" browser as standard, should continue to deliver high user numbers. Revenue is expected to increase again by a double-digit percentage. Due to higher costs, however, the operating profit will be somewhat lower, according to the forecast.