News notes
The Marketing Research Association (MRA), Washington, D.C., filed comments with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Washington, D.C., regarding an enforcement action against Boston marketing research company Compete Inc.
The FTC proposed a consent agreement with Compete on October 29, 2012, to settle alleged "charges that it violated federal law by using its Web-tracking software that collected personal data without disclosing the extent of the information that it was collecting [and] allegedly failed to honor promises it made to protect the personal data it collected." The consent agreement proposed by the FTC requires "Compete and its clients to fully disclose the information they collect and get consumers’ express consent before they collect consumers’ data in the future. In addition, the settlement bars misrepresentations about the company’s privacy and data security practices and requires that it implement a comprehensive information security program with independent third-party audits every two years for 20 years."
The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), Washington, D.C., submitted comments on the Compete agreement on November 19 and MRA filed comments on December 21 in response to EPIC's proposals, urging the FTC to reject EPIC's proposed additions to the Compete consent agreement.
EPIC urged the FTC "to (1) strengthen the Order by requiring Compete to implement Fair Information Practices similar to those contained in the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights; (2) make Compete’s independent privacy assessments publicly available; (3) clarify the scope of implicit deception in the context of privacy policies; and (4) develop a best practices guide for anonymization techniques." MRA maintains that none of these four ideas would prove positive for the research profession.
Acquisitions/transactions
New York researcher The Nielsen Company has agreed to acquire Columbia, Md., research company Arbitron Inc.
London research company Kantar Media has acquired Chicago media intelligence company AdGooroo.
Paris marketing company Publicis Groupe has acquired Mumbai, India, marketing consultancy MarketGate and MarketGate Dimensions, its research division.
Montréal research company Leger Marketing has acquired majority stake in Agility Metrics Inc., a Montréal customer experience management software company. Agility Metrics will be renamed Leger Metrics.
Association/organization news
Vancouver, B.C., research company Vision Critical has become a corporate member of the Marketing Research Intelligence Association, Toronto.
Awards/rankings
The Marketing Research Institute International, St. Louis, and The University of Georgia, Athens, Ga., awarded Ronald Kornokovich the Distinguished Service Award and Emeritus status in December 2012.
Fresno, Calif., research company Decipher Inc. was named to the 2012 Lead411 Tech 200 list, which ranks companies based on revenue percentage growth from 2008 to 2011 among privately-held business in the U.S. that earned more than $1 million in the past year.
New accounts/projects
New York clothing company Bonobos has adopted the Qualtrics Research Suite platform from Provo, Utah, research software company Qualtrics.
Datatelligence, an Ormond Beach, Fla., research company, has adopted Oslo, Norway, research company Confirmit's Confirmit Horizons Market Research platform.
The Arbeits-gemeinschaft Fernsehforschung, a Germany TV audience research cooperative, has extended its contract with Nuremberg, Germany, research company The GfK Group to continue monitoring TV viewing in Germany until 2018.
New companies/new divisions/relocations/expansions
Salt Lake City research company The Modellers has formed its Strategic Analytics Unit, focused on big data and predictive analytics. Marco Vriens will lead the operation.
Manchester, U.K., research company ResponseTap has opened its U.S. headquarters in New York. J. Scott Hamilton will head the office.
IBM, Armonk, N.Y., has announced plans to open an analytics center in Columbus, Ohio. The company aims to create 500 new analytics jobs over the next three years.
Framingham, Mass., research company Kadence International has opened a second U.S. office in Boston.The company plans to increase staff by 100 percent by 2014.