Organization and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies | Organization and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies Company Overview The Rubicon Project, Inc., or Rubicon Project (the "Company"), was formed on April 20, 2007 in Delaware and began operations in April 2007. The Company is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. The Company provides a technology solution to automate the purchase and sale of digital advertising inventory for buyers and sellers. The Company's platform features applications and services for digital advertising sellers, including websites, mobile applications and other digital media properties, and their representatives, to sell their digital advertising inventory; applications and services for buyers, including advertisers, agencies, agency trading desks, and demand side platforms, or DSPs, to buy digital advertising inventory; and a marketplace over which such transactions are executed. In the second quarter of 2019, the Company announced the beta program for Demand Manager, which helps sellers effectively monetize their advertising inventory by making it easier to deploy, configure, and optimize Prebid-based header bidding solutions. Prebid is a free and open source suite of software products designed by advertising community developers to enable publishers to implement header bidding on their websites and from within their apps. Together, these features power and enhance a comprehensive, transparent, independent advertising marketplace that brings buyers and sellers together and facilitates intelligent decision making and automated transaction execution for the digital advertising inventory managed on the Company's platform. The Company's clients include many of the world's leading publishers of websites and mobile applications and buyers of digital advertising inventory. Advertising inventory takes different forms, referred to as advertising units, is purchased and sold through different transactional methods, and allows advertising content to be presented to consumers through different channels. The Company's solution enables buyers and sellers to purchase and sell: • a comprehensive range of advertising units, including display, audio, and video; • that are transacted through real-time bidding, which includes (i) direct sale of premium inventory, which the Company refers to as private marketplace, or PMP, and (ii) open auction bidding, which the Company refers to as open marketplace, or OMP; and • that are displayed across digital channels, including mobile web, mobile application, and desktop, as well as across various out-of-home channels, such as digital billboards. Risks and Uncertainties The Company operates in the rapidly changing advertising industry and has faced demands by ad tech buyers for more efficiency and lower costs, changes in bidding technologies, and increased competition. The Company has adjusted its pricing model, which has reduced margins, and has lowered its expense structure to address these changes in the industry, resulting in net operating losses. The Company continues to incur net operating losses, despite having increased revenues and reduced costs. The Company must continue to increase revenues and/or manage costs in order to compensate for reduced margins, or it may not be able to grow its business and may continue to operate at a loss, depleting its cash resources and liquidity. If the Company continues to experience significant operating losses in the future, the Company may require additional liquidity to fund its operations. Basis of Presentation and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies The accompanying unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements have been prepared in accordance with United States Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, or GAAP, for interim financial information and the instructions to Form 10-Q and Article 10 of Regulation S-X. Accordingly, they do not include all of the information and footnotes required by GAAP for complete financial statements. In the opinion of management, all adjustments (consisting of normal recurring adjustments) considered necessary for a fair statement of the results for the interim period presented have been included. Operating results for the six months ended June 30, 2019 are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for any future interim period, the year ending December 31, 2019 , or for any future year. The condensed consolidated balance sheet at December 31, 2018 has been derived from the audited financial statements at that date, but does not include all of the disclosures required by GAAP. The accompanying condensed consolidated financial statements should be read in conjunction with the Company's audited consolidated financial statements and notes thereto for the year ended December 31, 2018 included in its 2018 Annual Report on Form 10-K. The Company adopted Accounting Standards Codification Topic 842 ("ASC 842")— Leases on January 1, 2019 using a modified retrospective approach. The adoption of this standard impacted only the financial statements included as of June 30, 2019 and for the three and six months ended June 30, 2019 . See below for additional information regarding the Company's adoption of ASC 842. Aside from the adoption of ASC 842, there have been no significant changes in the Company's accounting policies from those disclosed in its audited consolidated financial statements and notes thereto for the year ended December 31, 2018 included in its Annual Report on Form 10-K. Use of Estimates The preparation of condensed consolidated financial statements in conformity with GAAP requires management to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported and disclosed financial statements and accompanying footnotes. Actual results could differ materially from these estimates. Adoption of ASC 842 On January 1, 2019, the Company adopted ASC 842, which requires the recognition of the right-of-use assets, or ROU assets, and related lease liabilities on the balance sheet using a modified retrospective approach. The consolidated financial statements related to periods prior to January 1, 2019 were not restated, and continue to be reported under ASC Topic 840— Leases ("ASC 840"), which did not require the recognition of operating lease liabilities on the balance sheet. As a result, the consolidated financial statements related to periods prior to January 1, 2019 are not entirely comparative with current and future periods. As permitted under ASC 842, the Company elected several practical expedients that permit the Company to not reassess (1) whether existing contracts are or contain a lease, (2) the classification of existing leases, and (3) whether previously capitalized costs continue to qualify as initial indirect costs. In addition, the Company has elected not to recognize short-term leases on our balance sheet, nor separate lease and non-lease components for our data center leases. In addition, we utilized the portfolio approach to group leases with similar characteristics and did not use hindsight to determine lease term. In addition to the leases previously reported under ASC 840, the Company also reviewed its data center agreements to identify non-lease components that should not be included in the lease liability and lease expense under ASC 842. Certain fixed non-lease components of data center leases, primarily fixed minimum power commitments, have been included in the lease liability and ROU asset as the Company has elected the practical expedient for its data centers to not separate the lease and non-lease components; however, variable components have not been included. For identified leases, the Company used its incremental borrowing rate to discount the related future payment obligations as of January 1, 2019 to determine its lease liability as of adoption. As of the adoption date, the Company recognized a lease liability of $15.6 million and a corresponding ROU asset of $14.3 million ; there was no equity impact from the adoption. The difference between the lease liability and the ROU asset primarily represents the existing deferred rent liabilities balances before adoption, resulting from historical straight-lining of operating leases, which was effectively reclassified upon adoption to reduce the measurement of the ROU asset. The Company records rent expense for operating leases, including leases of office locations, data centers, and equipment, on a straight-line basis over the lease term. The straight-line calculation of rent expense includes rent escalations on certain leases, as well as lease incentives provided by the landlords, including payments for leasehold improvements and rent-free periods. The Company begins recognition of rent expense on the commencement date, which is generally the date that the asset is made available for use. The lease liability is included in lease liabilities, current and lease liabilities, non-current within the condensed consolidated balance sheet, which are reduced as lease related payments are made. The ROU asset is amortized on a periodic basis over the expected term of the lease. See Note 11 for additional information. Recent Accounting Pronouncements Under the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, or the JOBS Act, the Company meets the definition of an emerging growth company. The Company has irrevocably elected to opt out of the extended transition period for complying with new or revised accounting standards pursuant to Section 107(b) of the JOBS Act. In March 2019, the Financial Accounting Standards Board issued ASU 2019-01— Leases (Topic 842): Codification Improvements |