Microsoft's advertising business has launched two new products today: a Mobile Advertising software development kit (SDK) for Windows Phone 7 and Microsoft Advertising Exchange for Mobile, which it's describing as "the industry’s first real-time, bidded ad exchange in mobile".
The SDK makes it relatively straightforward for the creators of Windows Phone 7 applications to include targeted display ads in their programs. In addition, the mobile ad exchange will offer access to advertisements from a number of advertising networks.
Microsoft's rivals Apple and Google operate their own mobile advertising networks. The move coincides with the final version of Windows Phone Developer Tools being released.