Acquisitions/transactions  

Data collection firm Rep Data has acquired ResTech firm Research Defender to create a one-stop shop for research sampling and data fraud prevention technology. As a result of the acquisition, Vignesh Krishnan will serve as chief technology officer, Matt Gershner will transition to chief marketing and strategy officer and Dan Fletcher will become VP, client success. 

Digital experience analytics platform Contentsquare has signed a definitive agreement to acquire product analytics platform Heap.      

Professional services company Accenture has acquired integrated marketing firm SIGNAL to improve its integrated marketing capabilities in Japan.

Ipsos has acquired the New Vehicle Customer Study from InMoment to strengthen its position in the North America automotive market. 

Buying intent data platform NinaData has integrated with ad tech platform Equativ to improve consumer buying intent prediction.

Ipsos has acquired Behaviour & Attitudes, an Irish opinion and social research studies agency. Ipsos in Ireland and B&A will become Ipsos B&A. 

Alliances/strategic partnerships 

Digital insights company Verve and insight consultancy Basis have formed a strategic partnership to launch CoLab, a movement to address research respondent quality issues. 

Travel platform Traveloka has chosen analytics platform Contentsquare as its digital experience analytics partner. 

Business services firm Emergn and innovation and business strategy company Strategyzer have partnered to improve the innovation-transformation gap. 

NPR has renewed its relationship with audio analytics and research platform Veritonic to offer sponsors audio insights through its Brand Lift solution.

Amazon Web Services has launched an AWS for Media & Entertainment solution area focused on monetization and has integrated Comscore to allow access to its cross-platform data set and its viewership data. 

Southwest Airlines has partnered with experience management company Qualtrics to improve employee experiences. 

ResTech platform Forsta has added Publicis Media to its portfolio of technology customers in Germany.

Health care network Sutter Health has partnered with health care experience company Press Ganey to improve patient and employee experience. 

Kantar Profiles and Intuit Research have partnered to launch Media DOTS, a syndicated survey in Hong Kong.

Marketing data platform Aqfer has partnered with customer intelligence company Acxiom to offer its clients access to Acxiom’s catalog of descriptive data.  

Nielsen has partnered with audience data provider Eyeota and strategic analytics firm RDA Research to offer Australian advertisers and marketers access to its Consumer Media View data set. 

Advertising agency Dentsu and advertising measurement company VideoAmp have partnered on strategic audience buys across seven media publishers including NBCUniversal, Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery.

Sponsorship analytics platform Relo Metrics has partnered with sponsorship intelligence platform SponsorPulse to create a new brand metric for National Hockey League sponsors based on fan insights.

Media measurement platform Integral Ad Science has partnered with Instacart to offer transparency in Instacart Ads. 

Kantar Public has partnered with Faculty AI to launch Smart Matrix Analyser, an AI tool to improve the data synthesis stage of qualitative research studies. 

Association/organization news 

The Insights Association has nominated its CEO Melanie Courtright to serve on the Census Bureau’s 2030 Census Advisory Committee.  

UK Research and Innovation will invest £59 million in a six-year program aiming to offer researchers access to new forms of data.  

Women in Research has opened applications for its 2024 mentorship program. To apply visit www.womeninresearch.org/mentoring. 

Awards/rankings 

The Market Research Society has named the winners of its 2023 Operations Awards. To view the full list visit www.mrs.org.uk/awards/oppies. 

The Market Research Institute International and Full Circle Research have expanded the MRII Diversity Award to include registration to the Insights Association’s Corporate Research Conference and a travel and lodging stipend for awardees to attend the event. 

Gary Graves, CEO and co-founder of TotalCX has been named on the 2023 Channel Futures DE&I 101 list.  

The Advertising Research Foundation has named the winners of the David Ogilvy Awards. To view the full list visit https://thearf.org/2023-arf-david-ogilvy-award-winners/.  

Marketing research firm KS&R has been recognized as a 2023 Insights Association Top 25 Market Research Agency. 

The Profiles in Diversity Journal has named Larissa Jensen, SVP and global beauty industry advisor, Circana, to its 2023 Women Worth Watching in Leadership list.   

The 2023 DataIQ Awards has named data and analytics consultancy Cynozure as a Best Place to Work in Data.

The Market Research Institute International and KNow Research have named Dawn Carr, CEO and founder, Mahogany Insights, and Sequoyah Glenn, principal consultant, 924 Cooperative, as the winners of the Female Founder Award. 

The American Marketing Association Chicago has named Chris Duncan, VP, consumer insights and digital marketing, Claire’s, as the winner of the 2023 Marketer of the Year award. 

Ventana Research has named the winners of its 16th Annual Digital Leadership Awards. To view the full list of winners visit www.ventanaresearch.com/press-release/ventana-research-announces-the-winners-of-the-16th-annual-digital-leadership-awards. 

The Certification Institute for Research Quality has certified KJT Group to the ISO/IEC 27001:2022 information security standard. 

Integrated advertising platform Adform has received continued Media Rating Council accreditation across its desktop, mobile web and mobile in-app display and video environments.

Patrick Fiorenza, director of research analytics, Research & Marketing Strategies, has been recognized as a 40 Under 40 honoree by the CNY Business Journal.

New accounts/projects 

Ipsos has launched The Path, an industry initiative offering insights and analytics leaders a forum to share career paths, advice and stories. 

aha insights technology has launched its AI-powered aha momentsTM rapid response video capture for spontaneous feedback from consumers on current events, new ideas or cultural narratives.

Data collection company Norstat has launched its new corporate website. 

Consumer insights platform aytm has launched Insights Portal, a solution to connect consumer survey data. 

Stagwell Marketing Cloud has launched Harris Quest, a suite of AI-based research products, powered by The Harris Poll and Maru. 

New companies/new divisions/relocations/expansions  

ResTech company Delineate has chosen west Wales as its new headquarters location.

Chris Hauck has launched SCORE Metrics, a marketing research company focusing on adding competitive context to NPS programs. 

Research company earnings/financial news 

Customer voice platform UserEvidence has raised $9 million in its Series A round of funding led by Crosslink Capital. 

Conversational data startup PandasAI has raised $1.1 million in its pre-seed funding round to improve its AI assistant for data analysis. 

Market intelligence and search platform AlphaSense has raised $150 million in its Series E financing round led by BOND. 

Customer insights SaaS platform Revio has raised $2.5 million in Series A venture funding led by BankTech Ventures.  

Predictive intelligence platform Daash Intelligence has closed its $2.75 million seed funding round led by Silicon Road Ventures and New Stack Ventures.  

Observability and traceability platform Pantomath has raised $14 million in its Series A round of funding led by Sierra Ventures.

Data curation company Cleanlab has raised $25 million in its Series A funding round co-led by Menlo Ventures and TQ Ventures.