Two leading social intelligence companies come together to create new artificial intelligence-driven products to help every decision-maker better understand their consumers
Today Brandwatch and Crimson Hexagon, two leaders in the social intelligence space, announce the signing of a merger agreement. This merger, expected to close in Q4, creates a c. $100 million annual recurring revenue business that will move forward as Brandwatch.
“In this digitally connected world, our vision is to transform how organizations understand their consumers through products that bring structure and meaning to the public voices of billions of people. This merger allows us to accelerate towards that vision and move beyond social listening to innovate at the cross-section of the brand, market and consumer intelligence,” said Giles Palmer, Founder, and CEO of Brandwatch.
“We believe that our AI capabilities are unmatched in this industry, and our many customer successes bear witness to the value that it has driven over the years,” said Chris Bingham, Chief Technology Officer at Crimson Hexagon. “I am very excited to know that our 11-year investment in AI and Machine Learning is so valued by Brandwatch and that it will be at the very core of our new integrated platform.”
Work to integrate the products will begin immediately, although both products will continue to be supported and operate independently for an extended period. A new roadmap for the combined company will join Crimson Hexagon’s artificial intelligence and historical data index with Brandwatch Analytics’ data handling and flexible user interface, to create immense value for customers. Additionally, the company will add more data from marketing, customer behavior, and market research sources to the platform to expand beyond social intelligence.
“Our clients tell us that they need a faster, richer understanding of their markets and consumers based on public and proprietary data they trust. They need global reach, world-class professional services and fast, intuitive products they can put in the hands of non-analysts as they become more data-driven. This merger creates the best platform to provide this value to clients. We’re excited to take this to the next level,” said Palmer.
All existing clients will continue to have access to the platforms they currently are using, as well as the industry’s top-rated customer success teams.
Brandwatch was advised on the transaction by Macquarie Capital.
About Brandwatch
Brandwatch is the world’s enterprise social intelligence leader, empowering 1,400 of the planet’s most admired brands and agencies including Unilever, Walmart and Dell to make insightful, data-driven business decisions.
The company’s Analytics product surfaces business-critical insights within millions of online conversations, Brandwatch Audiences optimizes targeted influencer, content and paid social campaigns and the Vizia platform broadcasts insights to decision-makers throughout entire organizations. The company has made two acquisitions to date: PeerIndex (2013) and BuzzSumo (2017) as a standalone content marketing platform.
Brandwatch has offices around the globe including Brighton, New York, San Francisco, Berlin, Stuttgart, Paris, Singapore and soon Sydney.
About Crimson Hexagon
Crimson Hexagon helps global brands better understand their consumers. With instant access to the world’s largest volume of unstructured text and images across social, online public, and enterprise-held data sources, Crimson Hexagon’s AI-powered consumer insights platform allow clients to analyze audiences, track brand perception and campaign performance, and even detect competitive and market trends. Our clients include Anheuser-Busch InBev, Adidas, General Mills, Paramount Pictures, and Twitter.