News notes
Eric Salama, CEO of research company Kantar, was hospitalized in January after he was stabbed while reportedly confronting a man trying to steal his car in Kew, London. Salama did not sustain any life-threatening injuries.
The Media Rating Council board of directors voted in favor of granting continued accreditation of GfK MRI’s national syndicated measurement service.
Acquisitions/transactions
Communications company Publicis Groupe has announced its intention to acquire France-based data marketing firm Soft Computing. Publicis Groupe is looking to buy a controlling block representing 82.99 percent of the share capital at a price of 25 euro per share. The proposed acquisition is subject to prior information and consultation with the bodies representing Soft Computing’s staff as well as to the usual conditions precedent.
Chicago-based media software and services company Cision has acquired Falcon.io, a social media marketing platform based in Copenhagen, Denmark. Falcon.io will be offered as a stand-alone social media platform for marketers, advertisers and customer experience professionals and will also be integrated with the Cision Communications Cloud to expand social media capabilities to earned media and communications professionals.
Oslo, Norway-based data services company Norstat has acquired Hamburg, Germany, online consumer data firm mafo.de GmbH. Through the acquisition, Norstat will gain access to teams in Hamburg and Berlin, software solutions and the mafo.de panel with over 60,000 respondents.
LRW Group, a Los Angeles-based group of integrated marketing services companies, has acquired visual communication agency Killer Infographics. This is LRW’s sixth in a planned series of acquisitions. Killer Infographics will operate under strategic consultancy Kelton Global as a member company of LRW Group.
L&E Research, Raleigh, N.C., has acquired the focus suites division of Q & A Research Inc. in Kansas City, Mo., and Walnut Creek (East Bay), Calif. Q & A Research will continue to operate its quantitative and qualitative services without impact.
Chapel Hill, N.C., data, research and marketing services company Data Decisions Group has acquired Reach Analytics, a predictive marketing technology start-up.
Consumer Connections Research (CCR) has acquired The Martec Research Center in Green Bay, Wis. With the acquisition, CCR will operate as a full-service market research firm from a new facility in Green Bay. As part of the transaction, members of the Martec Research Center’s staff will join the new firm to provide full-service research with an emphasis on focus groups, product testing and online/telephone research.
Westlake Village, Calif., online sample marketplace PureSpectrum has acquired media agency Happy Market Research. Jamin Brazil, founder of Happy Market Research, will serve as president of PureSpectrum. The company’s staple program, the Happy Market Research podcast, will continue as is.
Plano, Texas, researcher Dynata (formerly Research Now SSI) reached an agreement to acquire Reimagine Holdings Group, a Westport, Conn., holding company focused on consumer insights and marketing services businesses. The acquisition is subject to regulatory approval and is expected to close in Q1 2019. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Reimagine Holdings is comprised of several business units including Critical Mix, an online survey and digital data company; MarketSight, a data analysis and visualization platform; and PopResearch, a brand and communications research platform.
Framingham, Mass., data and intelligence company Definitive Healthcare has acquired the data services business and assets of HIMSS Analytics, which includes the Logic, Predict, Analyze and custom research products.
San Francisco-based insights platform UserTesting has agreed to acquire UserMuse, a market research service designed for businesses that target corporate customers and institutions. The acquisition will create global testing panels for B2B and B2C companies.
Alliances/strategic partnerships
T-Mobile has partnered with research company HarrisX to create the HarrisX/T-Mobile 5G Consumer Index, a quarterly study that measures American attitudes, expectations and impressions regarding 5G wireless technology.
Nuremberg, Germany, research company GfK and Berlin-based artificial intelligence (AI) start-up SO1 have formed a partnership, giving GfK clients access to SO1’s AI and targeting capabilities. Through the partnership, GfK’s retail clients can apply total market insights from GfK consumer panels directly in order to impact purchasing decisions through promotion customization. Additionally, the two companies have developed targeting formats for GfK’s loyalty card portfolio. ATTRIBUTION + is a jointly-developed GfK platform that allows retailers to complete and enrich loyalty card data with information from GfK consumer panels.
Chandler, Az., company Ironwood Insights Group has partnered with Marty’s Orchid House, naming it the company’s official corporate charity. Marty’s Orchid House is a day program for children facing behavior, emotional and health challenges.
CX design and consulting firm CX Workout has formed a strategic alliance with online mobile research firm itracks. Itracks’ bulletin board focus groups will be coupled with the CX Workout journey-mapping platform, allowing companies to optimize their customers’ journey in real-time.
Research service providers Schlesinger Group and Civicom have formed a strategic alliance to enhance their ability to provide Web-enabled qualitative services. The alliance will focus primarily on Civicom facilitating Web-enabled in-depth interviews and focus groups and Schlesinger Group providing recruiting services. The two companies will continue to operate independently and maintain their own clients.
Association/organization news
The Insights Association and 28 other groups in the Census Project coalition urged the confirmation of Steven Dillingham as director of the Census Bureau ahead of the 2020 Census.
The Mobile Marketing Association, New York, has formed a brand-led Future of Mobile Fraud Council. The council aims to help marketers assess their exposure to fraud, combat fraud with tools and education and improve their ability to track the impact of their efforts using best practices. The initiative will be co-chaired by Kevin Frisch, CMO at Wag Labs, and Terri Schriver, SVP enterprise media, Bank of America.
The board of the Market Research Institute International (MRII) has elected Dan Coates, president and co-founder of Ypulse Inc., as board president for 2019. He succeeds Jeffrey Henning, who will become the new executive director. The board also elected Melanie Courtright as president-elect and Marjette Stark as treasurer, as well as four new members: Marion Boeri, Zoe Dowling, Dan Foreman and Zontziry Johnson. In addition, the MRII voted to offer the Canadian Research Insights Council, a newly formed trade body, an ex-officio seat on the board.
Los Angeles-based nonprofit Women in Research (WIRe) has added four new members to its 2019 advisory board: Alisa Hamilton, founder of Harvest Insights in Atlanta; Begoña Fafian, head of knowledge and insights at Coca-Cola WEBU in London; JD Deitch, chief revenue officer at P2 Sample in Paris; and Marion Elliot, sales director at Market Cube in New York. Advisory board members Christina Jenkins and Fiona Blades will be transitioning to emeritus status. Blades will continue in her role as WIRe’s New York event lead.
New accounts/projects
Nielsen, New York, and Hearst Television have completed a renewal agreement for local and national television and radio ratings, behavioral insights and measurement services. With the new agreement, Hearst stations will continue to use a range of Nielsen data and software solutions to offer a broader look at consumer viewing habits across key markets and geographies.
Nielsen, New York, and Raycom Media have announced a renewal agreement for Nielsen local television ratings service within most of Raycom’s LPM, SET and code reader markets. The agreement provides Raycom with complete measurement of select local broadcast stations as well as syndicated local TV measurement. It also includes viewing and consumer behavior and insight tools including Arianna, NLTV, Ad Intel and Scarborough-Local.
CBS Corporation and Nielsen, New York, have reached an agreement for Nielsen national, digital and local audience measurement. The renewal includes a range of services. CBS Television Network, CBS Television Distribution, Showtime Networks, Smithsonian, Pop, CBS Sports Network and CBS’ 27 owned-and-operated local television stations will continue to use Nielsen’s Total Audience measurement services as part of the deal. Financial terms were not disclosed.
New companies/new divisions/relocations/expansions
German software company quantilope is expanding into the U.S. market, opening an office in New York. Thomas Fandrich, the company’s co-founder and COO, will head up the U.S. business.
Qualitative research services firm Recruit and Field has relocated and expanded its recruiting headquarters in New York, with a new office address in Melville, N.Y.
Plano, Texas, company Research Now SSI has rebranded as Dynata. The company says the new brand reflects its strategy to provide data across the marketing spectrum to achieve new standards of marketing performance and to close the learning and knowledge loop across marketing disciplines. Research Now merged with research data company SSI in 2017.
Newtown Square, Pa., firm Research America has opened a central location testing facility located in Altamonte Springs, Fla. The space includes a focus group room and personal interviewing spaces, client monitoring facilities, a test kitchen, laundry testing areas and sensory testing rooms. The company has tapped Maddie Sutphin to lead the facility.
Discovery Research Group has added a new call center in Cheyenne, Wyo., to its network of U.S. phone centers. Overseeing the new center is Richard McCaffery.
Netherlands-based research technology company Nebu has opened two data centers in the U.S. and Southeast Asia.
Research company earnings/financial news
Data science and machine learning platform Dataiku Inc. has announced a $101 million Series C funding round led by ICONIQ Capital. The company says it plans to double its current staff at its New York City headquarters and offices in Paris and London as well as new offices in Sydney and Singapore. Dataiku will also add new product features and work to expand its network of technology partners.
Chicago-based social media marketing and analytics firm Sprout Social has announced $40.5 million in new funding from Goldman Sachs, New Enterprise Associates and led by Future Fund. The latest investment round brings the company’s total capital raised to $103.5 million. The company says the new funds will be used to deepen its platform capabilities and increase its international expansion.
In January, Alpharetta, Ga., sampling solutions firm P2Sample announced more than 60 percent year-over-year revenue growth for 2018. The company also reported 10 million survey completes over the previous 12 months.
Toronto-based data collection firm Delvinia has made an investment in Measure Protocol, a blockchain-powered marketplace. With the investment, Measure Protocol plans to extend its core development work into advanced cryptography for protecting consumer data and profiling and to launch its consumer-facing application business in the second quarter of 2019. As part of the relationship, Delvinia will provide Measure Protocol with strategic advice and identify opportunities to improve the research experience.
Canada-based qualitative research solutions firm itracks has secured $1.5 million in financing through RBC. The company says expansion plans include relocating to a software development facility and increasing staffing to support software releases in 2019.