Articles

Acquisition Article

The holidays call for a lot of cooking – and one essential ingredient is butter. 
That was also the case for <a href="https://www.tiugotech.com/" target="_blank">Tiugo Technologies,</a> an affiliate of leading M&amp;A firm <a href="https://www.psgequity.com/" target="_blank">PSG Equity</a> that specializes in early-stage mid-market technology companies. Tiugo recently announced the acquisition of Detroit-based <a href="https://buttercms.com/" target="_blank">ButterCMS</a>, welcoming the <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-free-headless-cms-platforms/">headless platform</a> to its family of brands.
This marks the second acquisition for Tiugo in 2022. In addition to its core consultancy, the company appears to be building an API-first portfolio of developer platforms – with a keen focus on content creation and digital collaboration. 
“We’re thrilled to welcome Butter to the Tiugo organization,” said Mark Hatton, PSG Senior Advisor and CEO of Tiugo. “We believe there is a substantial market for tools that help developers accelerate digital innovation. Our goal is for Tiugo to cultivate a suite of market-leading developer platforms focused on content creation and digital collaboration to help them scale successfully and effectively. Butter delivers enterprise-grade headless CMS capabilities to our launchpad, and we’re looking forward to expanding our offerings through future impactful acquisitions.”
<h2>Collaboration brings new opportunities for ButterCMS</h2>
ButterCMS is a provider of headless, API-first content management solutions. Founded in 2017, the platform helps customers draft, manage, review and publish dynamic marketing content to websites and online apps.
“As the digital revolution accelerates, ensuring companies have easy, efficient ways to publish and manage digital content across websites, apps, and digital experiences is mission-critical,” said <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/lumetta/" target="_blank">Jake Lumetta</a>, founder and CEO of ButterCMS. “With this in mind, we’ve developed our product ecosystem to help address these specific needs, and through our continued product innovation, we’re committed to providing our diverse, digital-forward customer base with the solutions they require. We’re eager to continue to serve our customers in even more powerful ways in collaboration with Tiugo and with the support of PSG.”
CMS Critic had the opportunity to <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/new-content-localization-capabilities-from-buttercms-qa-with-ceo-jake-lumetta/">speak with Jake Lumetta</a> in 2021. In the Q&amp;A, he outlined growth opportunities he saw for ButterCMS, as well as product upgrades and expansions that would help Butter stand out in the CMS marketplace.
<h2>Tiugo expansion continues</h2>
Tiugo Technologies, a PSG portfolio company, also <a href="https://www.tiugotech.com/news/tiugo-technologies-cksource-acquisition" target="_blank">acquired CKSource</a> in May 2022.
“We’re excited to support Tiugo as it continues to broaden its capabilities through acquisitions of companies like Butter with an aim to deliver a comprehensive set of platforms for the software developer community,” said <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/marco-ferrari-59877425/" target="_blank">Marco Ferrari</a>, Managing Director at PSG.
Tiugo did not disclose any of the acquisition's financial details for ButterCMS. That said, the company does expect to acquire additional software brands in 2023.
<h2>About ButterCMS  </h2>
Founded in 2017, ButterCMS is a leading provider of headless CMS solutions for digitally native enterprises and SMBs. Its portfolio includes hundreds of world-recognized brands. ButterCMS makes it simple and easy to draft, manage, review and publish dynamic marketing content to websites, online apps and digital experiences. To learn more about ButterCMS, visit <a href="http://www.buttercms.com/" target="_blank">www.buttercms.com</a>   
<h2>About Tiugo Technologies and PSG Equity   </h2>
Tiugo Technologies is assembling a portfolio of API-first, market-leading developer platforms focused on content creation and digital collaboration to help them accelerate growth, increase operating efficiency and fund add-on acquisitions. Our family of companies work together with an aim to succeed in the competitive developer platform market. Tiugo companies collaborate to offer holistic, differentiated solutions that grow faster, operate more efficiently and create more value together than they can alone. Tiugo is headquartered in Boston. To learn more about Tiugo, visit<a href="https://www.tiugotech.com/" target="_blank"> www.tiugotech.com</a>.    
PSG is a growth equity firm that partners with software and technology-enabled services companies to help them navigate transformational growth, capitalize on strategic opportunities and build strong teams. Having backed more than 115 companies and facilitated over 420 add-on acquisitions, PSG brings extensive investment experience, deep expertise in software and technology, and a firm commitment to collaborating with management teams. Founded in 2014, PSG operates out of offices in Boston, Kansas City, London, Paris, Madrid and Tel-Aviv. To learn more about PSG, visit<a href="http://www.psgequity.com/" target="_blank"> www.psgequity.com</a>. 
 
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Tiugo Technologies Enhances its Portfolio of Developer Platforms with ButterCMS

cms-critic-staff

Composite of ButterCMS logo, Tuigo Technologies logo, and PSG Equity logo.

No. It's not just a "figma" of your imagination. 
<a href="https://www.figma.com/blog/a-new-collaboration-with-adobe/" target="_blank">Adobe has agreed to spend $20 billion</a> – that's billion, with a "b" – to buy <a href="https://www.figma.com/" target="_blank">Figma</a>, the popular web-based collaboration and UI design platform. 
We'll give you a minute to pick your jaw up off the ground. 
Adobe said it expects the transaction to close sometime in 2023. That said, the deal has not yet been approved by Figma stockholders and must proceed through customary closing. The dollars are a mix: about half the total will be paid in Adobe stock, with the balance paid in cash. 
If you're not familiar with Figma, you will be now – but it's worth noting how awesome a platform it really is. It offers a deep set of collaboration options for joint software development, as well as its popular FigJam collaborative whiteboarding environment. If you haven't used that wipeboarding feature before, we highly recommend it. 
By now, we’re accustomed to Adobe spending big bucks to expand its copious monolith. These tasty acquisitions have bolstered its stronghold on the digital experience category – and while there may not be an Iron Throne to claim, it has certainly earned the crown as the King of the <a href="https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/3995917" target="_blank">Gartner Magic Quadrant for DXPs</a>.
But forget all that. Forget the fact that <a href="https://www.computerworld.com/article/3673934/adobes-20b-figma-acquisition-highlights-web-based-collaboration-trends.html#:~:text=The%20%2420%20billion%20figure%20is,a%20dedicated%20following%20among%20developers." target="_blank">Figma was valued at around $10 billion</a> at its last funding round in 2021 (meaning this purchase doubled the bounty). And let's not overlook that the market has been in a bout of turmoil lately, especially for tech stocks.
No – what's been really interesting is how this acquisition triggered such an emotional response from the market. Despite Adobe's enthusiasm about the deal, the Figma fanbase seemed a little less enthusiastic…
<img style="max-width:800px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2022/09/luke-skywalker-meme-no.jpg" alt="Luke Skywalker meme" />
And just like that, the Empire Strikes Back.
<h2>Why Figma? And why the pushback from fans?</h2>
The Figma acquisition speaks volumes about the growth of web collaboration software and the central role of design. But for its users, Figma represented everything Adobe wasn’t. In fact, Figma was a sort of the anti-Adobe. 
The fanbase has reason to be concerned: Adobe could bring Figma aboard the mothership under its expensive subscription model. There could be some poor integration or uncomfortable bloat. Even worse, it could become the kind of bolted-on utility that's prone to crashing – kind of like the Millennium Falcon with a broken hyperdrive.
Or, Adobe could do wonders with this amazing platform, building deeper functionality that expands the frontier for web-based collaboration within its toolsets. Figma's flexibility could be a game changer for the company and removes one of its digital experience rivals from the chessboard. 
One thing both companies have in common is the commitment to design. Founded by Dylan Field in 2016, Figma has held to the mantra that design should be collaborative, web-based, and real-time – with the mission to “open up” and move from the solitary design process. Figma has crystallized the concepts of sharing ideas and working collaboratively, something that Adobe’s UI design products like Photoshop have struggled to embrace. 
As for the fans, that's a product of Figma's heavy emphasis on community, which they have nurtured and grown over the years. This was likely a big driver of <a href="https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/figma/company_financials" target="_blank">Figma’s unicorn valuation</a>, which skyrocketed from <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-24/software-design-startup-figma-is-now-worth-10-billion" target="_blank">$2 billion to $10 billion</a> in just a year. With more than 4 million users, including giants such as Microsoft, Slack, Google, Dropbox, and Twitter, the company has achieved the kind of presence and loyalty that are the envy of the tech world.
 
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2022/09/nothing-great-is-made-alone.jpg" alt="Figma - Nothing Great is Made Alone" />
<h2> </h2>
<h2>Adobe XD vs. Figma</h2>
So let's get down to brass tacks: Adobe XD and Figma are currently the most popular design tools on the market, both with similar features. For the past 5 years, Figma has been the biggest rival and competitor to Adobe XD, but Figma has managed to with the hearts of the design community. 
Figma believes the acquisition will help the Figma platform benefit from Adobe’s technology, expertise, and resources in the creative space. Figma has big ambitions for its products, with plans to improve its <a href="https://www.figma.com/design/" target="_blank">Figma Design</a>, <a href="https://www.figma.com/figjam/" target="_blank">FigJam</a>, and the <a href="https://www.figma.com/community/" target="_blank">Figma community</a> platforms while expanding into new areas.
“We will have the opportunity to incorporate their expertise in imaging, photography, illustration, video, 3D, and font technology to the Figma platform," said <a href="https://twitter.com/zoink" target="_blank">Dylan Field</a>, Co-founder &amp; CEO of Figma. "Additionally, we will have the opportunity to reimagine what the best creative tools could look like within the Figma technology stack.”
Top-down leadership is key in these kinds of earth-shattering transitions. Taking designers’ concerns into account, Field reassured the Figma community that he will remain CEO and that Figma will keep operating autonomously – without compromising its culture, the way it runs its business, and (perhaps most importantly) its pricing. 
<h2>Growth by Acquisition</h2>
The news from Adobe is huge – but maybe not that surprising. Adobe has been driving growth by investing in tools and products to execute complex workflows across teams. As part of this evolution, it <a href="https://news.adobe.com/news/news-details/2020/Adobe-to-Acquire-Workfront/default.aspx" target="_blank">acquired Workflow</a> – a leading work management platform for marketers – for $1.50 billion in 2020. Last year, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/adobe-acquires-video-collaboration-platform-frame-io/" target="_blank">Adobe also acquired Frame.io</a>, an industry-leading collaboration platform, for $1.275 billion. 
In its <a href="https://news.adobe.com/news/news-details/2022/Adobe-to-Acquire-Figma/default.aspx" target="_blank">press release</a>, Adobe stated that Figma’s web-based, multi-player capabilities will accelerate the delivery of Adobe’s Creative Cloud technologies on the web, making the creative process more productive and accessible to more people.
With this acquisition, Adobe once more solidified its position in the creative industry. With responsive design taking over about a decade ago, other apps such as <a href="https://www.omnigroup.com/omnigraffle/" target="_blank">Omnigraffle</a> and later <a href="https://www.sketch.com/" target="_blank">Sketch App</a> were born – and embraced by designers by offering a better solution for creating wireframes and high-fidelity prototypes suited for the responsive web. This was a huge departure from Photoshop and Illustrator and their respectively rigid structures. 
Figma is not alone in the web-based collaboration and UI design space. Platforms like <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/uxpin-merge-review-sync-react-components-with-prototypes/">UXPin</a>, another subscription-based wireframing and prototyping tool, are effectively <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/uxpin-merge-review-sync-react-components-with-prototypes/" target="_blank">bridging the gap between designers and developers</a>. 
As Figma zeroes in on $400 million in revenues at the end of 2022, it's safe to say that there's ample potential in this growing market space – and we'll have to see how Adobe's mindboggling acquisition brings imagination to life. 
<h2>About Figma</h2>
Figma is the open design company founded in 2012 by Dylan Field and Evan Wallace. With Figma’s cloud-based screen design tool, teams achieve a shared understanding around design without worrying about syncing, exporting, or installing software. Anyone involved in the product development process can always share up-to-date files with a link. That makes it easy to collaborate on the latest designs and prototypes and see their code attributes. Figma has simplified collaboration across the entire design process for thousands of companies like Microsoft, Slack, and Uber and millions of users, including designers, developers, product managers, marketers, and others.

Shock and Awe: Adobe to Acquire UI Design Platform Figma for $20 Billion

paris-tuzun

CivicPlus, the integrated tech platform for local governments, has announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Optimere, a leading provider of digital compliance, accessibility, and records management solutions. Upon closing, Optimere's ArchiveSocial, Monsido, and NextRequest solutions will be integrated with CivicPlus' comprehensive platform to create a better experience for residents and agencies that serve them.
CivicPlus provides integrated tech solutions that help local governments optimize digital interactions for residents and staff. According to the <a href="https://analytics.usa.gov/" target="_blank">statistics</a>, government websites get an average of 2 billion visits each month. Unfortunately, government websites are known for being slow, outdated, and generally a pain in the rear to use and navigate around. In the <a href="https://itif.org/" target="_blank">Information Technology and Innovation Foundation's</a> (ITIF's) <a href="http://www2.itif.org/2017-benchmarking-government-websites.pdf" target="_blank">study</a> of almost 300 of the most popular federal websites, approximately 92 percent failed to perform well in at least one of key areas: security, page-load time, mobile-friendly design, and accessibility.
Last year, <a href="https://archivesocial.com/" target="_blank">ArchiveSocial</a>, a social media archiving software for record retention, <a href="https://monsido.com/" target="_blank">Monsido</a>, the website accessibility and UX software, and <a href="https://www.nextrequest.com/" target="_blank">NextRequest</a>, a FOIA request management software, had <a href="https://optimere.com/archivesocial-monsido-nextrequest-create-optimere/?utm_source=website&amp;utm_medium=press-room&amp;utm_content=press-release&amp;utm_campaign=optimere-launch" target="_blank">come together to form Optimere</a>, forming the most comprehensive platform for public-sector and regulated communicators to address their ever-increasing compliance requirements. Records retention, accessibility, and data privacy standards, including the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and the American Disability Act (ADA), are in place to optimize communications. However, complying with these increasing regulations often leads to expensive litigation versus better communications. Optimere was formed to provide a solution to these complex issues so that organizations can reduce these risks and engage effectively across social channels and websites, building trust. 
According to Brian Rempe, CivicPlus's Chief Executive Officer, the acquisition represents an opportunity for CivicPlus to strengthen its support of its public sector customers' transparency, compliance, and accessibility needs.
"CivicPlus is committed to empowering our customers with technology solutions and services that enable them to govern, serve, and operate in ways that foster resident trust and appreciation," said Rempe. "Transparency and compliance are foundational components to interactions that strengthen relationships between public administrations and the people they serve. By adding Optimere's products to our integrated platform, we will help our customers in their goal to make every resident interaction positive, personalized, and frictionless."
Rempe added that, upon closing, the combined company's leaders will develop a roadmap for aligning Optimere's solutions within its Civic Experience Platform.
Ray Carey, Optimere Chief Executive Officer, noted that he is excited about the transaction and the prospect of working and growing with the CivicPlus team. “This is a great next step for our passionate and innovative team members at Optimere,” said Carey. “Being able to collaborate with CivicPlus’s people and products will lead to tremendous shared learnings and strengthen our ability to be a valuable partner to those entities looking to embrace digital transformation in ways that foster transparency and positive digital interactions.”
This announcement follows CivicPlus' acquisition of Municode, the largest codifier of legal documents for local governments in the United States and a nationally recognized provider of agenda and meeting management and municipal website design solutions and furthers CivicPlus' mission to become a scaled partner for local government.
<h2>About CivicPlus</h2>
CivicPlus® delivers technology solutions that enable local governments to optimize the experience they deliver when interacting with residents. Over 7,500 local governments use their solutions when serving their 340 million residents. CivicPlus delivers the industry’s first and only Civic Experience Platform. It enables local governments to drive more revenue, operate more efficiently, and generate positive recognition for the many services they provide every day. For more information, visit <a href="https://www.civicplus.com/" target="_blank">civicplus.com</a>.
<h2>About Optimere</h2>
Optimere is the leading provider of digital compliance, accessibility, and records management solutions that illuminate the path to trusted communications. Optimere has over 6,000 customers globally and is the maker of brands including ArchiveSocial, Monsido, and NextRequest. For more information, visit <a href="https://optimere.com/" target="_blank">Optimere.com</a>.

CivicPlus Enters into Agreement to Acquire Optimere

commercetools, a leading headless e-Commerce platform, recently announced the acquisition of Frontastic, a composable frontend platform. 
The purchase comes just a few months after commercetools announced a $140 million <a href="https://commercetools.com/press-releases/commercetools-secures-140m-series-c-funding-round-to-accelerate-global-growth" target="_blank">Series C funding round</a> – a plump investment, to be sure, and one that the company hopes will broaden the reach of its game-changing commerce technology for creating differentiated user experiences.
It's worth noting that commercetools was one of the earlier headless commerce platforms on the scene, helping to shape the modern standards for headless commerce. Their decoupled environment now enables a multitude of commerce capabilities across an ever-growing network of channels and endpoints. Like other platforms in the composable field, commercetools also embraces the <a href="https://machalliance.org/" target="_blank">MACH principles</a> – providing a truly open, modular environment that enables businesses to quickly embrace innovation and respond to change.  
"We've been partnering with the Frontastic team since the very beginning and see a huge market opportunity for their Composable Frontend Platform around the world," said Dirk Hoerig, CEO, and Co-Founder of commercetools. "With this powerful combination, we're bringing the MACH (Microservices, API, Cloud, and Headless) movement to the mid-market as well as to digital business teams so that more companies can benefit from modern commerce experiences."
commercetools has enjoyed a strong presence in Europe and North America, but their global aspirations are clear. Their expansion will undoubtedly be bolstered by their "Leader" position on <a href="https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/4005295/magic-quadrant-for-digital-commerce" target="_blank">Gartner's 2021 Magic Quadrant for Digital Commerce</a> – making this their second consecutive year in this coveted segment. 
<img style="max-width:487px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/11/gartner-magic-quadrant-for-digital-commerce-2021-quadrant-graphic.png" alt="Gartner Magic Quadrant for digital commerce 2021 Quadrant" />
In a previous article, we featured commercetools as one of <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-headless-commerce-platforms/" target="_blank">our Top Headless Commerce Platforms</a>, so be sure to check that out.
<h3>What is Frontastic?</h3>
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/11/frontastic-header.png" alt="frontastic workflow" />
Based in Germany, Frontastic is a composable frontend platform for API-First e-Commerce and headless CMSes. It enables brands to build websites quickly and easily with headless capabilities by removing the complexity for developers – and giving business teams autonomy and flexibility. 
Frontastic combines four tools:
<ol>
<li>An API hub that includes standard integrations for commerce, content, search, and connectivity to any API.</li>
<li>Developer tooling that includes a CLI to manage components with a built-in workflow to go from development to testing to production.</li>
<li>Frontastic Studio, an easy-to-use interface that enables teams to manage pages, components, navigation, and layouts.</li>
<li>Frontend delivery via a Progressive Web App (PWA) – which provides great performance and an app-like user experience – and server-side rendering that ensures fast delivery and SEO-friendly pages.</li>
</ol>
While their combined capabilities have yet to be fully explored, the existing partnership between commercetools and Frontastic will likely enable a more efficient time to integration.
"We're excited to become part of the impressive commercetools growth story," said Thomas Gottheil, CEO, and Co-Founder at Frontastic. "We created Frontastic to help enterprises build the best shopping experiences – regardless of which commerce platform they use. By joining forces with commercetools, we can support even more brands on a global scale."
<h2>The impact of headless commerce and MACH architecture</h2>
As companies accelerated their digital transformation strategies throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, the retail industry – hit hard by the shutdown of brick-and-mortar storefronts – drove the leap to digital commerce. To be sure, many organizations already had an integrated strategy for selling in both physical and online stores. However, in the throes of the pandemic, those online stores became their only channel, and they invested heavily in e-Commerce solutions that could amplify their capabilities and be quickly deployed.
You've probably heard the buzz around MACH and the evolution of composable architectures. If not, let's start with the basics: MACH is an acronym for Microservices-based, API-first, Cloud-native, and Headless. While the MACH architecture is a relatively new concept, it's quickly gaining popularity due to its modular nature – allowing businesses to compose the best tools to meet their exact business requirements and scale their experiences rapidly. 
The <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-headless-commerce-platforms/" target="_blank">headless</a> approach has moved from niche to normal. While the "<a href="https://www.akana.com/blog/composable-architecture" target="_blank">composable architecture</a>" concept is much newer, it's also becoming more popular as digital transformation enters its next wave. And it makes sense: leading up to Covid, digital stacks were already becoming decoupled and less monolithic, all driven by the rise of the <a href="https://www.openapis.org/" target="_blank">open API</a>. Much of this investment in a composable enterprise is driven by the rise in composable commerce and its impact on the application landscape. 
Gartner predicts that by 2023, organizations that embrace composability will <a href="https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/3986490/composable-commerce-must-be-adopted-for-the-future-of-ap" target="_blank">outpace the competition by 80%</a> in implementing new product features.
commercetools, which made the exclusive 2021 list of privately held "unicorn companies" worth over $1 billion, has experienced accelerated growth over the past year, with recent customer wins that include Alcon, Debenhams, Direct Wines, Express, LEGO, L.L. Bean, Screwfix, Volkswagen, and Zenni Optical. With the addition of the Frontastic composable frontend technology to the company's product portfolio, commercetools is building a broader set of commerce technology services to support global enterprises – and ultimately reinvent e-Commerce.
<h2>About Frontastic</h2>
Founded in 2017, Frontastic is a composable frontend platform that unites business and development teams to build amazing commerce sites on headless – fast. It connects to any API to unify tech landscapes and provides the necessary tools so commerce teams can focus on innovating new features. Within a short time, the company has successfully established itself as the new standard for commerce frontends, with its customers seeing up to 50% higher conversion rates and up to 50% faster time to market.
Find out more about Frontastic on <a href="http://www.frontastic.cloud/" target="_blank">www.frontastic.cloud</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/frontasticGmbH" target="_blank">Twitter</a>, and <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/company/frontastic-gmbh/" target="_blank">LinkedIn</a>.

commercetools Acquires Frontastic, Adds Composable Frontend Capabilities to Headless Commerce

Composite image of the commercetools and frontastic logos on a blended background

With little time to reflect on <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-ai-powered-search-platform-reflektion/" target="_blank">Sitecore's recent acquisition of Reflektion</a>, another enterprise DXP has helped itself to strategic snack – providing more evidence that the market's appetite for expansion is still voracious. 
Just a few days ago, <a href="https://www.acquia.com/faq/acquia-acquires-widen" target="_blank">Acquia</a>, a leading digital experience platform, announced its purchase of <a href="https://www.widen.com/" target="_blank">Widen</a> – a cloud-native digital asset management (DAM) and product information management (PIM) provider. 
While the past 18 months have seen a relentless cycle of consolidation across the industry, it now seems that <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/key-takeaways-from-gartners-2021-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms/" target="_blank">Gartner's crop of DXP leaders</a> are playing pole position around critical gaps in their DXP stack. What started with optimization and customer data is now evolving into a heated race for robustness on every level – and for Acquia, digital asset management has been missing from the mix.
Here's more on what the acquisition could mean for the Drupal-based DXP platform.
<h2>Widen bring best-of-breed DAM and PIM capabilities to Acquia</h2>
Widen's value proposition is fairly simple: it unites <a href="https://www.widen.com/blog/digital-asset-management" target="_blank">digital assets</a> such as rich media, product information, and marketing content into a single workflow and provides an intuitive interface that democratizes access to a brand's resources. 
In layman's terms, it makes finding and using assets like video, graphics, and copy much easier for marketing professionals (or anyone for that matter).
Whether you're a content strategist, UX designer, marketer, or web developer, delivering a great user experience is always the mission – and good content is essential to that goal. Widen has focused on the asset side of the Content Operations flow, enabling users to enhance their experience with access to the right components. 
Acquiring the capabilities of a DAM and a PIM are "strategic gold" for Acquia. To create personalized customer engagement at scale, brands are creating immense volumes of digital content. Traditionally, DAMs have helped simplify a marketer's access to this content while managing versions and workflows to ensure consistency. But within the context of a DXP, a modern DAM must also provide robust technical capabilities and extensibility. Additionally, a PIM solution should enable product data enrichment with marketing copy and digital assets to easily create branded product content. 
Together, these capabilities help organizations create and refine distinctive digital experiences based on evolving customer preferences – which is exactly what Acquia aims to do. It's also worth noting that the worldwide market for <a href="https://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/5311981/digital-asset-management-market-global-industry" target="_blank">DAM is projected to grow to $8.5B by 2025</a>, a 15% CAGR. <a href="https://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/5304126/product-information-management-global-market" target="_blank">PIM is set to increase from $8.8B last year to $18B in 2027</a>, an 11% CAGR. This underscores the value of the investment. 
"Acquia has long been an established leader in managing textual website content," said Dries Buytaert, Co-founder, and CTO of Acquia. "Now, with Widen, we will be able to offer world-class capabilities around rich media and product information content. Widen is consistently ranked a leader by industry analysts for vision, execution, and market presence. We have numerous joint customers today and believe Widen software will deliver value to Acquia Marketing Cloud and Drupal Cloud customers. We're excited to welcome the Widen team to the Acquia family and to collaborate with them on Acquia Open DXP."
<h2>Acquia Open DXP with Widen maximizes the value of digital content </h2>
When it comes to expanding the stack, the buying spree continues – and Acquia was already leading a similar trajectory as other DXPs, particularly in the Customer Data Platform (CDP) layer. Aquia <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/acquia-digital-commerce-unifies-data-content-commerce-and-digital-merchandising/" target="_blank">acquired AgilOne</a> two years ago, while in the last six months, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-boxever-and-four51/" target="_blank">Sitecore acquired Boxever</a> and Optimizely <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/optimizely-acquires-customer-data-platform-zaius/" target="_blank">acquired Zaius</a>. 
While some other platforms have already addressed DAM capabilities as part of their DXP offering, Widen presents a more advanced solution that will enable Acquia with key advantages. Now, marketers will be able to create, review, manage, distribute and analyze content across the entire lifecycle and support complex marketing workflows and enterprise DXP requirements.
"With Widen, we continue to differentiate Acquia Open DXP by adding enterprise-grade, cloud-native DAM, and PIM capabilities," said Mike Sullivan, President, and CEO of Acquia. "We will immediately invest in accelerated development of the Widen solution and leverage our global capabilities and partner network to bring it to marketing organizations that use Acquia Open DXP to manage, transform and deliver digital assets at scale."
Widen also goes beyond managing creative assets to include storing unstructured data such as legal documents, insurance claims, and contact lists. The marketing-friendly Widen PIM solution delivers product data from creators to customers – centralizing it for syndication across websites, catalogs and e-commerce channels. 
Widen also brings a portfolio of more than 700 customers to the Acquia ecosystem, including notable brands like Carnival Cruises, Crayola, Energizer, Kohler, LG, McCormick, New Balance, Progressive, and more. This is yet another differentiator for Acquia as they look to compete with other leading enterprise platforms. 
"Content is the heart of any digital experience," said Matthew Gonnering, CEO of Widen. "It influences action across marketing channels; email, social media, content management systems, marketing campaigns, e-commerce, product information management, and more. By combining with Acquia, a company that shares Widen's belief that radical innovation starts with commitment to customers and the community, we will continue to rapidly innovate our solutions to support the first and only open digital experience platform."
Widen will be available as part of Acquia Open DXP or as a standalone offering. To read more, visit the <a href="https://www.acquia.com/blog/acquia-continues-rapid-growth-plans-acquire-widen" target="_blank">Acquia</a> or <a href="https://www.widen.com/blog/an-open-message-from-widen-ceo-matthew-gonnering" target="_blank">Widen</a> blogs.
The transaction is expected to close in late September 2021.
<h2>About Acquia</h2>
<a href="https://www.acquia.com">Acquia</a> empowers the world's most ambitious brands to create digital customer experiences that matter. With open-source Drupal at its core, the Acquia Digital Experience Platform (DXP) enables marketers, developers, and IT operations teams at thousands of global organizations to rapidly compose and deploy digital products and services that engage customers, enhance conversions and help businesses stand out.
<h2>About Widen</h2>
Established in 1948, <a href="https://www.widen.com/">Widen</a> builds high-performing software that empowers organizations to create impactful, measurable and consistent brand experiences. Its platform spans brand management, marketing resource management, and product information management solutions and has enabled over one million marketers, content creators, and technologists at over 660 global brands to better connect with audiences. Customers include Dyson, New Balance, Energizer, Laura Mercier, Nars, Zeiss, Salvation Army, Citizen Watch, the Atlanta Falcons, Carnival Cruise Line, and many more. Headquartered in Madison, Wisconsin, USA, and with a European office in London, UK, Widen has the highest customer loyalty in the digital asset management (DAM) industry.

Acquia Widens Its DXP Stack with Widen, Acquires DAM and PIM Capabilities

In the battle for digital domination, search reigns supreme – and brands are stepping up their search game.According to a survey by SearchNode, 68% of eCommerce industry leaders are improving their search functionality in 2021 and expanding the lens of their magnifying glasses. That plays directly into today's news that digital experience platform provider <a target="_blank" href="https://www.sitecore.com/">Sitecore</a> is acquiring San Mateo-based <a target="_blank" href="https://reflektion.com/">Reflektion,</a> an AI-powered digital search solution that understands and predicts patterns, context, and needs – so brands can convert more shoppers into buyers.The addition of Reflektion's technology will enable Sitecore to better engage, educate, and empower shoppers to make purchase decisions faster – increasing buyer confidence, long-term revenue, and overall customer satisfaction and loyalty.The acquisition – a continuation of Sitecore’s epic <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-embarks-on-1-2b-investment-plan-to-accelerate-growth/">$1.2 billion growth plan</a> – will help marketers solve the information overload that is characteristic of traditional search solutions, which can impede a customer's ability to find and select the products they're looking for.When <a target="_blank" href="https://www.webfx.com/seo/statistics/#:~:text=When%20people%20go%20online%20to,search%20engine%20to%20guide%20them.">93% of all online experiences start with search</a>, it's fair to say that it's essential to the customer buying journey. Reflektion elevates the value of search by transforming it into a conversational, guided experience that provides more personal, accessible, and tailored answers for the customer. “Search is about more than just entering words into a box and hoping for the right results – it is the cornerstone of a digital experience," said <a target="_blank" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/tzikakis/">Steve Tzikakis</a>, CEO, Sitecore. "With Reflektion, a brand can add various types of search including personalized search, preview search, conversational search, and voice search. This reduces customers’ effort and anxiety to find exactly what they need – with more convenience and speed – and leads to increased customer satisfaction with more conversions and revenue. Acquiring Reflektion reinforces Sitecore’s position as the leader in digital experience technologies that meets customers at the moment with more relevant, intuitive, and human experiences.”<h2>Elevating the E-commerce Experience with AI</h2>Reflektion brings an array of complementary commerce, AI, and personalization capabilities to Sitecore, which will further augment the DXP's acquisition of <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-boxever-and-four51/">Four51,</a> <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-boxever-and-four51/">Boxever</a>, and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-moosend-adds-ai-powered-email-marketing-automation/">Moosend</a>. Together, this nexus of data and deep learning technologies will allow Sitecore to seamlessly deliver intelligent, personalized, real-time information across channels.Four51’s API-first, headless e-commerce solution enables organizations to quickly and easily deliver engaging shopping experiences, helping them improve customer satisfaction, loyalty, and advocacy. Four51’s feature set complements their existing B2C commerce capabilities while the Customer Data Platform (CDP) Boxever enhances customer intelligence with AI-driven personalization tools – making it easy to capture, unify and activate customer data and deliver personalized experiences at scale.With a robust stack powering their growth across data and digital commerce, search presents an ideal channel for connecting and expanding Sitecore's breadth of capabilities – and Reflektion delivers on that vision.“Since its inception eight years ago, Reflektion has become recognized for its unique approach to search-product discovery technology," said Amar Chokhawala, Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Reflektion. "Our technology uses AI to adjust each consumer’s digital experience, in the moment, based on diverse data from multiple channels. I am proud of the passionate team at Reflektion who has been successful in bringing our AI-first approach to many site-search deployments for large e-commerce and retailers’ websites. With Sitecore, the Reflektion team and customers will be able to continue to leverage the enhancement of digital experiences, leading to continued growth and results for all.”The acquisition is expected to close in September 2021.<h2>Ramping Up the Competition</h2>Sitecore fired a "shot heard 'round the DXP world" last January when it announced its ambitious $1.2 billion growth strategy – which brewed speculation amongst competitors and analysts alike.While the mature market player celebrated its fourth year in a row as a Leader on <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cmscritic.com/key-takeaways-from-gartners-2021-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms/">Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for DXPs</a>, it fell slightly behind both Acquia and Episerver (now Optimizely). <img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/01/gartner-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms-2021.png" alt="Gartner Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms-2021" /><a target="_blank" href="https://www.contentful.com/resources/forrester-wave-agile-cms-2021-report/">Forrester’s Q1 Wave Report for Agile CMSes</a> paints a similar picture. Since 2019, Sitecore has elevated its Strong Performer status, now straddling the fence of the Leaders circle with a wider market presence. But like the Gartner MQ, they are lagging behind Acquia and Optimizely.With the acquisition of Boxever, Four51, Moosend, and now Reflektion, Sitecore seems poised to pounce. As competition heats up at the highest level of the enterprise, CMS and DXP players are accelerating their investment in innovation – and buying up the missing pieces to their platform puzzle. With consumers relying more on AI-driven voice assistants like Siri and Alexa, the channel opportunities for search are expanding in dynamic ways. Sitecore's bid to stay top-of-mind and top-of-market will require more than acquisitions. But their stack is looking more like a vision – and that's what every platform is searching for.<h2>About Sitecore</h2>Sitecore delivers a digital experience platform that empowers the world’s smartest brands to build lifelong relationships with their customers. A highly decorated industry leader, Sitecore is the only company bringing together content, commerce, and data into one connected platform that delivers millions of digital experiences every day. Leading companies including American Express, ASOS, Kimberly-Clark, L’Oréal and Volvo Cars rely on Sitecore to provide more engaging, personalized experiences for their customers. Learn more at <a target="_blank" href="https://www.sitecore.com/">Sitecore.com</a>.<h2>About Reflektion</h2>Reflektion’s Digital Commerce Experience Platform for eCommerce and Retail listens to the behaviors of each individual shopper, utilizes <a target="_blank" href="https://reflektion.com/glossary/artificial-intelligence-ai/">Artificial Intelligence</a> to calculate their preferences and intent, and then responds to every moment-to-moment interaction by displaying the most relevant content and products in real-time and across the digital touchpoints that matter most—including preview and site search, product recommendations, category and <a target="_blank" href="https://reflektion.com/glossary/landing-page/">landing pages</a>, and email.Leading retail brands such as Skechers, Ulta, Reeds, Petco, Ascena and RiteAid rely on Reflektion’s platform.Founded by pioneers in Artificial Intelligence and awarded both the Best eCommerce Solution and Best Overall Business Technology Solution by SIIA in 2019, Reflektion combines individual shopper insights, product intelligence, and <a target="_blank" href="https://reflektion.com/glossary/artificial-intelligence-ai/">AI</a> to create more relevant and impactful eCommerce experiences.

Sitecore Acquires AI-Powered Search Platform Reflektion

With <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/805656/number-youtube-viewers-worldwide/" target="_blank">1.86 billion YouTube users</a> and the explosion of <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/en/" target="_blank">Tiktok</a>, it's clear that video is eating the internet. 
According to <a href="https://www.semrush.com/blog/youtube-stats/" target="_blank">statistics</a>, video is one of the most popular ways to consume content, with 85% of U.S. internet users accessing online video through YouTube at least once per week. Further, the demand for pandemic-induced streaming content is at an all-time high, with <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/250934/quarterly-number-of-netflix-streaming-subscribers-worldwide/" target="_blank">Netflix</a> counting 207.64 million paid subscribers worldwide in Q1 of 2021.
Of course, no one knows this better than <a href="https://www.adobe.com/" target="_blank">Adobe</a>, which powers best-of-breed video production via their flagship <a href="https://www.adobe.com/products/premiere.html" target="_blank">Premiere Pro</a> and <a href="https://www.adobe.com/products/aftereffects.html" target="_blank">After Effects</a> products. Speed continues to be a critical component when it comes to video content creators, and in recent years, other tools have disrupted the market – including basic tools like Wondershare's <a href="https://filmora.wondershare.com/?AFFILIATE=102100&amp;__c=1" target="_blank">Filmora</a> and free platforms like <a href="https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/" target="_blank">DaVinci Resolve</a>. The widening expanse of choices has driven down costs and increased access to a wider range of users. 
To compete, Adobe is turning to the workflow "gap" that exists in the market around video collaboration. To shore up their offering and better position against the competitive field, the digital giant <a href="https://news.adobe.com/news/news-details/2021/Adobe-to-Acquire-Frame.io/default.aspx" target="_blank">has entered into an agreement to acquire Frame.io</a>, an industry-leading video collaboration platform. 
The transaction, valued at $1.275 billion, is expected to close during the fourth quarter of Adobe’s 2021 fiscal year.
<h2>What is Frame.io?</h2>
Frame.io streamlines the video production process by enabling video editors and key project stakeholders to collaborate using cloud-first workflows seamlessly. The cloud-native platform provides an elegant way to gather feedback from everyone involved in the video production – from the director to the script supervisor to all the people who need to approve the final project. 
<div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9 mb-4"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/7LjejmHOiTw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></div>
Recently, Frame.io launched "<a href="https://www.frame.io/c2c/" target="_blank">Camera to Cloud</a>," the fastest, easiest, and most secure way to instantly get footage from cameras to collaborators anywhere in the world. Adobe has already been working with Frame.io to collaborate on videos for their website, social media, and events.
<h2>Collaboration is the name of the game</h2>
In a pandemic-driven world, shooting on location or traveling to obtain footage is becoming a more arduous task – if not altogether impossible. In addition, more teams are expected to work remotely yet still deliver large volumes of video content, all at a time when the demand for video content is increasing exponentially. 
All these changes have forced the video industry to adapt and rethink, and Adobe has been leading the way by investing in tools and products to execute complex workflows across teams. As part of their evolution, they <a href="https://news.adobe.com/news/news-details/2020/Adobe-to-Acquire-Workfront/default.aspx" target="_blank">acquired Workflow</a> – a leading work management platform for marketers – for $1.50 billion last year. This was rivaled by Salesforce's <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/cms-monthly-recap-salesforce-completes-acquisition-of-slack-contentsquare-accelerates-ml-capabilities-and-more/" target="_blank">recent acquisition of Slack</a>, the leading team communications platform. 
What's clear is that digital collaboration is now a key foundation of all creative endeavors. Video teams must produce an ever-increasing continuum of content, and each video project requires various stakeholders, including video editors, producers, agencies, and clients. 
Today’s video workflows are disjointed, with multiple tools and communication channels being used to solicit stakeholder feedback. Frame.io eliminates the inefficiencies of video workflows by enabling real-time footage upload, access, and in-line stakeholder collaboration in a secure and elegant experience across surfaces.
“We’ve entered a new era of connected creativity that is deeply collaborative, and we imagine a world where everyone can participate in the creative process,” said Scott Belsky, Chief Product Officer and Executive Vice President of Adobe's Creative Cloud. “With this acquisition, we’re welcoming an incredible customer-oriented team and adding Frame.io’s cloud-native workflow capabilities to make the creative process more collaborative, productive, and efficient to further unleash creativity for all.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/09/image-viewer.png" alt="Frame.io image viewer" />
Adobe’s acquisition of Frame.io brings Adobe Creative Cloud’s collaboration services to video. It builds on recent innovations for creative collaboration, including Adobe Creative Cloud Libraries, Cloud Documents, Design Systems in Adobe XD, Adobe Stock, and Adobe Fonts – which together with Frame.io, will make it easy for teams to collaborate across Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and other Adobe Creative Cloud applications.
The combination of Adobe’s industry-leading creative software and Frame.io’s review and approval functionality will deliver a collaboration platform that powers the entire video editing process.
<h2>Video workflows must empower all stakeholders</h2>
With the combination of Frame.io and Adobe, Creative Cloud customers – from video editors to producers to marketers – will benefit from seamless collaboration on video projects. Frame.io's workflow functionality will now be a native part of Adobe Creative Cloud applications like Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, and Adobe Photoshop.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/09/commenting-and-collaboration.jpg" />
“Frame.io and Adobe share a vision for the future of video creation and collaboration that brings together Adobe’s strength in video creation and production and Frame.io’s cloud-native platform,” said Emery Wells, Frame.io's co-founder and CEO. “We’re excited to join Adobe to continue to drive video innovation for the world’s leading media and entertainment companies, agencies, and brands.”
Upon close of the acquisition, Wells and fellow Frame.io co-founder John Traver will join Adobe. Wells will continue to lead the Frame.io team, reporting to Scott Belsky. The transaction, valued at $1.275 billion (subject to customary purchase price adjustments) is expected to close during the fourth quarter of Adobe’s 2021 fiscal year and is subject to regulatory approval and customary closing conditions. Until the transaction closes, each company will continue to operate independently.
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
The role of video in any content strategy is more pronounced than ever. As CMS and DXP platforms continue to expand their functionality and integrations, the ability to leverage video and ease the process of delivery will be instrumental. With Adobe remaining solidly in a leadership role across multiple DX categories, they are uniquely positioned to think ahead of the market and address critical issues – like workflow collaboration.
While their heritage as a creative development ecosystem is strong, Adobe's vision for mapping the future of digital experiences is even stronger. We'll be curious to see how these latest investments chart as more products enter the hot video market and lower the barrier to entry. As Gen Z influencers generate instant videos with off-the-shelf tools and resources on their iPhones, it's clear that the game will continue to change at multiple levels. Even so, there's a compelling need to work with other people in a production environment – and that's where Adobe is leading the way.
<h2>About Frame.io</h2>
<a href="https://www.frame.io/" target="_blank">Frame.io</a> is one of the world’s leading video review and approval platforms with over 1 million users. Integrated with most major professional video tools, Frame.io streamlines the creative process by centralizing assets and feedback in the cloud. This allows remote creative teams to collaborate securely and in real-time from anywhere in the world.
Conceived and designed in 2015 by video creators Emery Wells and John Traver, Frame.io is intuitive and simple, yet powerful enough for creative professionals, technical administrators, and clients to use with little (or no) training. Frame.io accelerates workflows and eliminates obstacles to creativity. From script or storyboard to dailies through delivery, Frame.io has reinvented the modern video workflow.
<h2>About Adobe</h2>
Adobe is changing the world through digital experiences. For more information, visit <a href="https://cts.businesswire.com/ct/CT?id=smartlink&amp;url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.adobe.com&amp;esheet=52479752&amp;newsitemid=20210819005739&amp;lan=en-US&amp;anchor=www.adobe.com&amp;index=3&amp;md5=16bfbb09ccdd811085bcdfd56783339b" target="_blank">www.adobe.com</a>.

Adobe Acquires Video Collaboration Platform Frame.io

It would appear that the cows have come home: in a surprising move, Sitecore yesterday that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire <a href="https://moosend.com/">Moosend</a>, an e-mail marketing automation and campaign management platform used by a diverse set of customers. This includes leading brands such as Domino’s, Interpublic Group, and Sephora, among others. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of May. 
“Moosend perfectly complements Sitecore’s industry-leading core offering to create a personalization powerhouse for modern enterprises," said <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/tzikakis/" target="_blank">Steve Tzikakis</a>, the CEO of Sitecore. "Moosend’s state-of-the-art marketing automation and AI-powered customer engagement features will streamline Sitecore’s ability to engage, nurture, and convert customer relationships to deliver personalized experiences across every channel. The combined offering will make it easier for marketers to deploy and measure campaigns and automate workflows across the entire customer journey – a game-changer for <a href="https://www.bcg.com/publications/2020/responsible-marketing-with-first-party-data" target="_blank">the majority</a> of brands not yet set up for lifecycle marketing.” 
Acquisitions have become almost commonplace among the leaders in the CMS and DXP categories, particularly with solutions that expand a platform's capabilities around data. According to Sitecore, this move was driven by the ongoing shifts in data-driven personalization – and the risks and challenges posed by privacy. While data is essential to personalization, there are mounting concerns around privacy due to breaches caused by problematic data collection methods. This, along with other factors, have businesses questioning the value of personalization at scale. 
In fact, back in 2019, Gartner <a href="https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2019-12-02-gartner-predicts-80--of-marketers-will-abandon-person" target="_blank">predicted</a> that 80% of marketers would abandon personalization efforts by 2025 due to the increased complexity and a lack of consumer trust. It was a gloomy outlook for both marketers and technology vendors, but clearly on point in a world of scaling data privacy governance. 
Consumers are often unaware of how and when their data is being collected and where it is used. They’re also experiencing overload from increasingly cluttered inboxes and mobile notifications, causing them to ignore even the most carefully customized message. The resulting conundrum has left CMS and DXP platforms struggling with how to serve personalized experiences while meeting the consumer expectation of privacy and trust across multiple dimensions. 
“It’s a paradox of modern times," said Tzikakis. "Consumers expect brands to cater to them as unique individuals, providing a consistent experience everywhere and rewarding loyalty in deeper ways; at the same time, they want privacy first – more control over data, less confusion on how it’s used, and an end to creepy targeting and algorithmically garbled messaging that only a bot would love.” 
Recognizing the depth of the privacy problem, Sitecore aims to facilitate both the modern art and science of earning customer relationships through experiences – to make consenting to data-sharing an afterthought. If they can deliver on this vision, they may have a significant advantage in shaping the future of the industry.
The acquisition of Moosend is just the latest move in Sitecore’s ambitious $1.2 billion growth plan. In a highly publicized purchase less than two months ago, the DXP leader <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-boxever-and-four51/" target="_blank">acquired</a> two companies on the same day: Boxever, a SaaS-based Customer Data Platform (CDP) providing decisioning and experimentation, and Four51 – a digital commerce pioneer that powers custom, highly scalable e-commerce B2B marketplace solutions. With the addition of Moosend, it appears that Sitecore has amassed everything it needs to deliver a complete, end-to-end SaaS-based digital experience platform – and elevate their competitive posture. 
<h3>About Sitecore</h3>
Sitecore delivers a digital experience platform that empowers the world’s smartest brands to build lifelong relationships with their customers. A highly decorated industry leader, Sitecore is the only company bringing together content, commerce, and data into one connected platform that delivers millions of digital experiences every day. Leading companies including American Express, ASOS, Carnival Cruise Lines, Kimberly-Clark, L’Oréal, and Volvo Cars rely on Sitecore to provide more engaging, personalized experiences for their customers. Learn more at <a href="https://www.sitecore.com/">Sitecore.com</a>.

Sitecore Acquires Moosend, Adds AI-Powered Email Marketing Automation

Optimizely (formerly Episerver), a leading Digital Experience Platform, <a href="https://www.episerver.com/company/press-room/optimizely-strengthens-its-digital-experience-leadership-with-acquisition-of-customer-data-platform-zaius">announced today that it has acquired Zaius</a>, a Customer Data Platform (CDP).
The announcement comes just months after the company’s <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/episerver-to-acquire-optimizely-the-worlds-leading-experience-optimization-platform/">acquisition of Optimizely</a> last September, which led to <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/episerver-rebrands-as-optimizely-following-acquisition/">Episerver's rebranding</a> of its entire organization under the Optimizely banner.
“At Zaius, we’ve always believed that having the customer’s context was the unfair advantage to creating the most relevant experiences for customers,” said Spencer Pingry, co-founder and co-CEO of Zaius. “Analytics, segmentation, predictions, and personalization fueled by this context lead to experiences that drive customer loyalty. We are proud of how that has created growth for our customers and partners, and look forward to joining Optimizely to expand that story.”
<h3>The race for customer data</h3>
As enterprise content management (CMS) and digital experience (DXP) platforms battle for market share, customer data has become an almost essential component in the fight. With the purchase of Zaius, Optimizely is now positioned with a data-driven stack of services that will power digital experiences for customers – and elevate their competitive posture.
Breaking down "data silos" has become a critical objective for many organizations. According to <a href="https://learn.segment.com/customer-data-platform-report-2021/">Segment’s 2021 CDP Report</a>, 73% of companies say that a CDP will be instrumental to their customer experience strategy. Based on the metrics detailed in the report, 2020 saw exponential growth in customer data – and that only appears to be growing.
DXPs have recognized this problem, and are now making rapid progress towards unifying their data. For example, in the CDP layer of the stack, Segment is connecting customer data from fragmented corners of the ecosystem. This is why Twilio dropped a whopping $3.2 billion to <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/twilio-acquires-segment-for-3-2b-adds-market-leading-cdp-for-building-data-driven-apps/">acquire Segment</a> for building and powering data-driven apps.
Likewise, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/adobe-experience-cloud-adds-new-headless-cms-capabilities-updates-to-commerce-integration/">Adobe has invested</a> heavily in the customer data column, enhancing their platform capabilities for creating personalized, app-like experiences that leverage customer data from end to end. And most recently, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-acquires-boxever-and-four51/">Sitecore acquired Boxever</a> – adding a proven CDP to their ecosystem.
<h3>Combining DXP and CDP capabilities</h3>
Optimizely lost little time catching up with the other big platforms (like Adobe), acknowledging that organizations can no longer rely on third-party customer data to personalize experiences. With Zaius, Optimizely will be able to bridge what has traditionally been disconnected data points and bring them into context with one another.
In addition to being data-driven, Optimizely aspires to be customer-centric. With Zaius, they will now be able to segment customer data in combination with their interactions, observe behaviors through experiments, and gain powerful insights. Having a complete understanding of all those factors will enable Optimizely’s customers to create hyper-personalized experiences and maximize their ROIs.
Zaius’s segmentation engine – coupled with Optimizely’s behavioral data from experiments and transactional insights from its content and commerce platform – will provide a new level of agility. Powered by out-of-the-box AI/ML predictions, the combined platform can unlock even more value by providing visibility and guidance through the lens of the customer.
Zaius also brings 50 pre-built app connectors to Optimizely – including <a href="https://www.shopify.com/">Shopify</a>, <a href="https://www.snowflake.com/">Snowflake</a>, and <a href="https://www.zendesk.com/">Zendesk</a> – which are available as one-click integrations. These connectors rapidly streamline the data integration process and automate identity resolution with consent management.
<h3>A Leader on the Gartner MQ for DXP</h3>
Optimizely has been recognized as a Leader for the second consecutive year in the <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/key-takeaways-from-gartners-2021-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms/">Gartner 2021 Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms</a>, trailing right behind Adobe and <a href="https://www.acquia.com/">Acquia</a>.
<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card"><img style="max-width:600px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/s_34fafa0fd97f0b313e9551a1a563ae47406307c485dcb3a22cab4c5d6a2125fe_1616432299291_figure_1_magic_quadrant_for_digital_experience_platforms.png" /></figure>
While the players have shifted positions from 2020, the crop of leaders has made significant investments or acquisitions in customer data platforms to compete more effectively.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, Salesforce has been gaining ground against DXPs in the Challenger quadrant. As the world’s leading CRM and customer data platform, they have elevated their position by addressing key deficiencies on the experience and content management side – which includes the <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/salesforce-cms-review-evolving-a-crm-powerhouse-into-a-dxp-challenger/">launch of their own CMS</a> in late 2019.
<h3>What's next for Optimizely and Zaius</h3>
With the purchase of Zaius, Optimizely has fully stacked their deck – adding the all-important customer data piece to the puzzle. As they begin to integrate the core capabilities into their platform offering, it's conceivable that they may give Acquia and Adobe a run for their money in next year's MQ report.
As 2021 continues to unfold, we'll be watching the impact of this investment and how it continues to shape Optimizely's strategy.
<h3>About Optimizely (Episerver)</h3>
<a href="http://www.optimizely.com/">Optimizely</a> (Episerver) is on a mission to help people unlock their digital potential. With their leading digital experience platform (DXP), they equip teams with the tools and insights they need to create and optimize in new and novel ways. Now, companies can operate with data-driven confidence to create hyper-personalized experiences. Building sophisticated solutions has never been simpler. Optimizely’s 900+ partners and 1100+ employees in offices around the globe are proud to help more than 9,000 brands, including Toyota, Santander, eBay, KLM, and Mazda, enrich their customer lifetime value, increase revenue and grow their brands.
<h3>About Zaius</h3>
Zaius is the Activated Customer Data Platform that assists growing brands to achieve higher customer lifetime value by delivering relevance across the entire customer journey, from anonymous browsers to loyal shoppers. Zaius aligns entire organizations around customer data allowing digital leaders to create relevant customer experiences through harmonization of their data, understanding and action that differentiates their brand and drives customer loyalty.

Optimizely Acquires Customer Data Platform Zaius

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<a href="https://www.hyland.com/en">Hyland</a>, an enterprise content management (ECM) and process management provider, has <a href="https://news.hyland.com/hyland-enters-into-agreement-for-the-acquisition-of-nuxeo">signed an agreement</a> providing for exclusive negotiations to acquire <a href="https://www.nuxeo.com/">Nuxeo</a> – a content services and digital asset management (DAM) platform.
A leading ECM provider, Hyland is best known for its <a href="https://www.onbase.com/en">Onbase</a> and <a href="https://www.hyland.com/en/perceptive">Perceptive</a> content management products, which securely centralize enterprise content and deliver relevant information to users across a wide variety of industries – including healthcare, finance, insurance, higher education, and manufacturing.
Nuxeo offers a cloud-native, open-source, low-code platform with content services and DAM capabilities, among others.
“We’ve innovated an entirely modern platform that provides both enterprise-class content services and digital asset management capabilities," said Eric Barroca, CEO of Nuxeo. "And we look forward to bringing these capabilities to the Hyland portfolio as well as leveraging Hyland’s considerable global resources to deliver even greater success to our customers and partners."
<h3>A Leader on the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Content Services Platforms</h3>
<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/03/figure_1_magic_quadrant_for_content_services_platforms.png" alt="Magic Quadrant for Content Services Platforms" style="max-width:570px" /></figure>
Hyland has been a consistent force in the ECM and content services landscape, commanding the second-place position in the Leader Quadrant of <a href="https://www.hyland.com/en/explore/gartner-magic-quadrant-for-content-services-platforms">Gartner’s 2020 Magic Quadrant for Content Services Platforms</a>.
While Hyland has been trailing right behind <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2020/12/08/over-200-million-users-rely-on-sharepoint-as-microsoft-is-again-recognized-as-a-leader-in-the-2020-gartner-content-services-platforms-magic-quadrant-report/#:~:text=Leading%20in%20the%20Gartner%20Content,Platforms%20Magic%20Quadrant%20for%202020.">Microsoft’s 365 platform</a> (fueled primarily by <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/sharepoint/collaboration">Sharepoint</a>), they were also being followed closely by <a href="https://www.alfresco.com/">Alfresco</a>, a fast-growing open-source content services platform that was gaining ground in the market but still viewed as a somewhat niche solution by large enterprises.
Following suit with many other CMS and DXP platforms in the last year, Hyland <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/hyland-acquires-alfresco-focuses-on-cloud-and-global-expansion-of-enterprise-cms/">acquired Alfresco</a> in 2020, eliminating their next closest competitor and changing the game in the leadership grid.
While buying a competitor is far from novel, Alfresco’s low-code tools – combined with its ability to integrate artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) services from <a href="https://www.alfresco.com/ecm-software/aws">cloud providers like AWS</a> – were likely key factors in Hyland's decision, enabling them to accelerate their modernization efforts.
<h3>Adding Nuxeo's low-code AI service and DAM capabilities</h3>
With the Nuxeo acquisition, Hyland is consuming another competitor – this time from the Visionary quadrant of Gartner's MQ for Content Services Platforms.
Nuxeo brings some unique assets to Hyland that may translate into significant advantages against Microsoft and Sharepoint. First, it gains <a href="https://www.nuxeo.com/content-services-platform/ai/">Nuxeo Insight</a> – an AI offering that enables customers to use their own data and content to train custom ML models for a variety of business applications. This includes enriching content with metadata, classifying people, products and records, automating forms processing, and more.
The critical advantage with Nuxeo Insight is that it generates ML models that are trained with a customer’s own data – rendering them far more accurate and insightful than typical AI services offered through public clouds (like AWS).
Nuxeo is also known for its strong enterprise <a href="https://www.nuxeo.com/solutions/dam-digital-asset-management/">DAM capabilities</a>, which provide out-of-the-box solutions for enterprises. Additionally, its large-scale repository – which includes NoSQL and distributed file system options – provides storage and scalability support for organizations with a large number of documents.
In fact, last year, Nuxeo proved its scalability performance with an <a href="https://benchmarks.nuxeo.com/11-billion-benchmark-story/">11-billion-object benchmark test</a> on AWS.
<h3>What does the Nuxeo acquisition mean for Hyland?</h3>
Considering some of Hyland’s core industry verticals – specifically finance – Nuxeo may be well worth the investment. Along with its cloud-native, low-code solutions, Nuxeo's open source community and AI-driven capabilities address key gaps in Hyland's modernization strategy, and will likely be a source of continued product innovation.
The transaction is expected to close in April 2021. Until that time, both companies will continue to operate as two companies. Upon transaction close, Nuxeo's business will be integrated into Hyland.
<h3>About Nuxeo</h3>
<a href="https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&amp;l=en&amp;o=3043355-1&amp;h=141805745&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nuxeo.com%2F%3Futm_source%3DPRNewswire%26utm_medium%3Dpress%2520release%26utm_campaign%3Dhitrust&amp;a=Nuxeo">Nuxeo</a>, the developer of the leading Content Services Platform, is reinventing <a href="https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&amp;l=en&amp;o=3043355-1&amp;h=1356444015&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nuxeo.com%2Fproducts%2Fenterprise-content-management%2F%3Futm_source%3DPRNewswire%26utm_medium%3Dpress%2520release%26utm_campaign%3Dhitrust&amp;a=enterprise+content+management">enterprise content management</a> (ECM) and <a href="https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&amp;l=en&amp;o=3043355-1&amp;h=3747046695&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nuxeo.com%2Fproducts%2Fdigital-asset-management%2F%3Futm_source%3DPRNewswire%26utm_medium%3Dpress%2520release%26utm_campaign%3Dhitrust&amp;a=digital+asset+management">digital asset management</a> (DAM). Nuxeo makes it easy to build smart content applications that enhance customer experiences, improve decision making, and accelerate products to market. Its cloud-native, low-code platform has been deployed by large enterprises worldwide. Customers like Electronic Arts, TBWA, ABN AMRO, and CVS have used Nuxeo's technology to transform the way they do business. Founded in 2000, the company is based in New York with offices across the United States, Europe, and Asia. Learn more at <a href="https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&amp;l=en&amp;o=3043355-1&amp;h=1092214406&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nuxeo.com%2F%3Futm_source%3DPRNewswire%26utm_medium%3Dpress%2520release%26utm_campaign%3Dhitrust&amp;a=www.nuxeo.com">www.nuxeo.com</a>.
<h3>About Hyland</h3>
<a href="https://www.hyland.com/">Hyland</a> is an enterprise content management (ECM) software platform, combining integrated document management, business process management, and records management in a single application. Hyland software allows organizations to manage, control, and share digital content with employees, business partners, customers, and other constituencies. Learn more at <a href="https://www.hyland.com/en">www.hyland.com</a>

Hyland Enters Agreement to Acquire Nuxeo

Another week, another big twist in the enterprise CMS and DXP battle for market dominance.
This time, it’s Sitecore making waves, proving there’s only one thing better than acquiring a strategic company – and that’s buying two at the same time.
Just weeks after unveiling a <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-embarks-on-1-2b-investment-plan-to-accelerate-growth/">$1.2 billion investment plan</a> to fund innovation and accelerate growth, Sitecore <a href="https://www.sitecore.com/company/news-events/press-releases/2021/03/sitecore-acquires-boxever-and-four51">announced</a> it has entered into definitive agreements to acquire <a href="https://www.boxever.com/">Boxever</a>, a SaaS-based Customer Data Platform (CDP) providing decisioning and experimentation, and <a href="https://four51.io/">Four51</a>, a digital commerce pioneer that powers custom, highly scalable e-commerce B2B marketplace solutions.
When Sitecore originally announced its daring yet elusive investment plan in mid-January, there was a great deal of speculation about their strategy. Very little was revealed about how the funds would be used, or if any acquisitions were on the horizon.
With this move, Sitecore has answered a big part of the market's questions – and positioned themselves to better compete at the top with the likes of <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/acquia-digital-commerce-unifies-data-content-commerce-and-digital-merchandising/">Acquia</a>, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/episerver-to-acquire-optimizely-the-worlds-leading-experience-optimization-platform/">Optimizely</a> (formerly Episerver), and <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/adobe-experience-cloud-adds-new-headless-cms-capabilities-updates-to-commerce-integration/">Adobe</a>.
<h3>Adding Customer Data Platform (CDP) capabilities</h3>
One of the gaps that every CMS and DXP is racing to address exists around customer data. As brands and organizations demand greater personalization to optimize value and loyalty throughout the buying cycle, customer data is fueling the experience management engine – and having a CDP strategy is no longer a luxury, but a necessity.
Boxever has been on a roll with its CDP offering. The platform provides a rich, 360-degree view of customers with advanced segmentation, real-time decisioning, and experimentation capabilities. The system acts as the “brain” within an organization’s marketing stack, rendering every customer interaction more relevant and engaging.
With Boxever’s multi-dimensional capabilities, Sitecore will be able to enhance customer intelligence with AI-driven personalization tools, making it easy to capture, unify and activate customer data and deliver personalized experiences at scale.
<h3>Elevating headless e-commerce</h3>
As the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated digital transformation, brands discovered <a href="https://www.historyofheadlesscommerce.com/">headless commerce</a> – and leaned on its extensible framework to rapidly power their omnichannel strategies.
Four51’s API-first, headless e-commerce solution enables organizations to quickly and easily deliver engaging shopping experiences, helping them improve customer satisfaction, loyalty, and advocacy.
According to Sitecore, Four51’s feature set will complement their existing B2C commerce capabilities, enabling them to define the digital experience market in new ways. Additionally, the combined offering will require less upfront investment, with a horizon of continuous innovation and a dramatically shorter time to value.
<h3>Competing in a growing field of Digital Experience Platforms</h3>
For Sitecore, the pandemic has highlighted the need for a flexible and modern Digital Experience Platform (DXP) to provide organizations with both agility and intelligence to keep pace with changing demands.
While CMS platforms have begun to migrate their capabilities to meet the definition of a DXP, the goalposts continue to move – driven by rapidly accelerating innovation and consolidation.
Like its competitors, Sitecore recognizes the gaps and is making bold moves to shore them up. By integrating Boxever and Four51 with their proven suite of capabilities, Sitecore will be positioned to deliver a true content-to-commerce, SaaS-based DXP.
The resulting solution would enable businesses to deliver real-time, personalized digital experiences across every touchpoint, including the full buying cycle from order fulfillment to service beyond the sale. Technical organizations will also get an open stack built for modern architectures, with applications that are more intelligent, agile and always up-to-date.
<h3>Buyer’s remorse?</h3>
In their announcement, Sitecore acknowledged the skepticism surrounding the recent trend of acquisitions and consolidations in the marketing technology sector.
Still, the CDP train seems unstoppable. Gartner has <a href="https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/3983209/market-guide-for-customer-data-platforms">predicted</a> that “70% of independent CDP vendors will be acquired by larger marketing technology vendors or will diversify through M&amp;A of their own to enter adjacent categories such as personalization, multichannel marketing, consent management, and/or MDM for customer data.”
But is all this activity paying off? Unfortunately, the data suggests that most of these strategic acquisitions have left customers feeling disappointed with the feature sets, particularly around personalization.
In fact, Gartner has further <a href="https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2019-12-02-gartner-predicts-80--of-marketers-will-abandon-person">predicted</a> that 80% of marketers who have invested in personalization will abandon their efforts due to the lack of ROI and distrust from consumers due to growing privacy issues. <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/03/google-says-it-wont-track-you-directly-in-the-future-as-it-phases-out-cookies.html">Google’s recent news</a> that it will phase out browser cookies for ads is the latest sign that the data privacy landscape is changing rapidly, and the impact on personalization will continue to evolve.
<h3>Consistent positioning from Gartner and Forrester</h3>
With the acquisition of Boxever and Four51, Sitecore is hoping to do more than just stay in the game – they clearly want to uplevel it. Perhaps these two pieces to the puzzle will prove highly advantageous to their near and long-term goals by offering a SaaS-based, API-first Digital Experience Platform that expands the breadth of their data and commerce capabilities.
<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card"><img style="max-width:600px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/01/gartner-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms-2021.png" alt="Gartner Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms-2021" /></figure>
Recently, both Gartner and Forrester issued their 2021 reports for enterprise DXP and CMS. While Sitecore celebrated its fourth year in a row as a Leader on <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/key-takeaways-from-gartners-2021-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms/">Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for DXPs</a>, it fell slightly behind both Acquia and Episerver (now Optimizely).
<a href="https://www.contentful.com/resources/forrester-wave-agile-cms-2021-report/">Forrester’s Q1 Wave Report for Agile CMSes</a> paints a similar picture. Since 2019, Sitecore has elevated its Strong Performer status, now straddling the fence of the Leaders circle with a wider market presence. But like the Gartner MQ, they are lagging behind Acquia and Optimizely – with Adobe maintaining its clear dominance in the category.
<h3>The impact of the CDP revolution</h3>
The recent announcement from Sitecore codified one thing: that CMS and DXP platforms are feverishly racing to add CDP to their core offerings.
According to <a href="https://learn.segment.com/customer-data-platform-report-2021/">Segment’s industry report</a> released last month, 73% of companies reported that a CDP will be critical to their customer experience, and integrating that capability can enhance the value of a content management or digital experience platform.
As a side note, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/twilio-acquires-segment-for-3-2b-adds-market-leading-cdp-for-building-data-driven-apps/">Segment was acquired by Twilio</a> in November 2020 for $3.2 billion. This move further demonstrates that CDPs are broadly viewed as a strategic acquisition for a multitude of technology platforms – particularly in a COVID-19 world where organizations require more access to data-driven tools to grow and compete.
The explosive growth in this category is made abundantly clear in the graph below:
<img style="max-width:700px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/03/segment-cdp-report-data-1024x695.png" alt="Segment cdp report data" />
<h3>What’s next for Sitecore?</h3>
They say timing is everything. When Sitecore announced their ambitious investment plan, it was just the latest in a high-intensity cycle of headlines from across the martech stack – and may have been perceived as a response to other newsworthy activities.
Unlike their rivals, the lack of clarity around their $1.2 billion investment stirred questions about their market goals, compounded by growing competitive friction and setbacks. But behind the scenes, they clearly had their sights set on key acquisitions that would accelerate their growth and address the aforementioned gaps in their strategy.
With the integration of Boxever and Four51, Sitecore can now deliver what the market needs: industry-leading content and customer data management, omnichannel delivery, headless commerce, testing, journey optimization, and more. With these capabilities in their toolkit, they are better positioned to compete at the top of the market.
The acquisitions are expected to close before the end of March 2021, and financial terms are not being disclosed. Upon completion, the CEOs of both Boxever and Four51 will take on leadership roles – and Sitecore expects to invest and expand in both Boxever's Dublin, Ireland and Four51’s Minneapolis, Minnesota locations.
Now, which marketing technology vendor is bold enough to score a hat trick... and buy three companies at once?
<h3>About Sitecore</h3>
Sitecore delivers a digital experience platform (DXP) that empowers the world’s smartest brands to build lifelong relationships with their customers. A highly decorated industry leader, Sitecore is the only company bringing together content, commerce, and data into one connected platform that delivers millions of digital experiences every day. Leading companies including American Express, ASOS, Carnival Cruise Lines, Kimberly-Clark, L’Oréal, and Volvo Cars rely on Sitecore to provide more engaging, personalized experiences for their customers. Learn more at <a href="https://www.sitecore.com/">Sitecore.com</a>.

Sitecore Acquires Boxever and Four51

Image of hand tapping on a mobile phone with Sitecore, Boxever, and Four51 logos on the front

Fresh off the acquisition of Optimizely last September, Episerver – a leading content management and digital experience platform – has announced that it will rebrand its entire organization under the Optimizely name.
Episerver’s move follows a string of jaw-dropping news from the top of the CMS and DXP industry. In the last two weeks alone, Sitecore <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-embarks-on-1-2b-investment-plan-to-accelerate-growth/">announced</a> that it had secured $1.2 billion in capital investment aimed at accelerating their growth and innovation. Just a few days later, Acquia introduced its <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/acquia-digital-commerce-unifies-data-content-commerce-and-digital-merchandising/">Acquia Digital Commerce</a> platform, the latest in a line of new products and partnerships that are driving their market expansion.
As a leader on the <a href="https://www.episerver.com/reports/gartner-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms">Gartner Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms</a>, Episerver is already well-positioned within the DXP landscape. However, the acquisition of Optimizely has launched a new direction for the company, elevating “Optimization as a Service” to the forefront of their product and service stack.
While it’s not uncommon for companies to change their name after a merger or acquisition, this is a bold move for Episerver. By adopting the Optimizely brand, they are changing the narrative and focusing on web targeting, testing, and recommendations to help power – and optimize – the customer experience.
<h3>The reason behind Episerver’s decision</h3>
Episerver’s roots date back to 1994. What began as web-based electronic mail system has evolved into a connected, multi-faceted platform that includes CMS, Commerce, and DXP. Over the years, they have acquired multiple technologies in an effort to expand their ecosystem and enhance the value of their offerings. This includes <a href="https://www.episerver.com/company/press-room/episerver-acquires-omnichannel-personalization-vendor-peerius">Peerius</a> in 2016, a UK-based commerce personalization company, and most recently Optimizely.
Episerver has certainly established its brand on a global stage, competing with the likes of <a href="https://www.adobe.com/marketing/experience-manager.html">Adobe</a>, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/acquia-launches-new-open-digital-experience-platform/">Acquia</a>, and <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/sitecore-updates-experience-platform-and-experience-commerce-releases-new-sitecore-content-hub/">Sitecore</a>. But with such a long and storied rise to market leadership, why change their name?
In a statement from the company, Episerver says that it conducted thorough research with customers, partners, and industry leaders to gauge their overall brand perception. This led to the decision to adopt the Optimizely brand, which aligned more intently with their vision.
<img style="max-width:600px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/01/gartner-magic-quadrant-for-digital-experience-platforms-2021.png" alt="Gartner Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms-2021" />
<h3></h3>
<h3>Positioning for greater competition</h3>
While Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for DXPs remains relatively trim, the crowd has thickened in 2020. With players like Salesforce and SAP entering the fray by offering more complete solutions, traditional CMS platforms are struggling to find footing and compete at the enterprise level.
While the move away from monolithic services to custom stacks is still the general trend, leading brands and organizations are in pursuit of personalization – and hungry for real solutions. As CRM platforms like Salesforce and Hubspot bring CMS into their portfolios, stalwarts like Episerver are facing increased pressure to expand their capabilities in new directions.
The Optimizely acquisition gives Episerver an edge in the personalization category, allowing them to deliver on the promise of a truly complete digital experience platform for testing and optimization. This is reinforced by their concept of <a href="https://www.episerver.com/products/capabilities/optimization-as-a-service">Optimization-as-a-Service</a>, which combines the best attributes of targeting, testing, and recommendations from both <a href="https://www.optimizely.com/platform/experimentation/">Optimizely Web</a> and <a href="https://www.episerver.com/products/capabilities/web-content-recommendations">Episerver Content Recommendations</a>.
“We believe that every experience can and should be optimized,” says Alex Atzberger, CEO of Episerver. “We all know the real work only starts when the site or digital experience goes live. Optimizely’s name captures this ambition.”
<h3>What does the change mean for Episerver?</h3>
The new Optimizely aims to deliver the most modern digital experience platform with headless CMS and commerce, experimentation, AI-driven recommendations, and many other market-leading digital experience components. As part of their mission, they endeavor to remove the “guesswork” and “gut decisions” from optimization, replacing it with data-driven insights.
“Digital experience is a journey without a finish line,” says Atzberger. “Ultimately, our customers want to innovate and use data to confidentially create and optimize every customer experience based on actual outcomes. The Optimizely brand very much galvanizes this vision and uniquely positions us to define the future of the DXP market.”
Bringing together robust capabilities for data, content, commerce, and optimization, Optimizely empowers brands to unlock behavior-based decision-making, confident creation, and outsized outcomes. Optimizely now offers an even more robust combination of user and site-level data, tied with omnichannel experimentation insights – giving marketers, merchandisers, and developers the advanced analytics they need to understand what is happening in each experience as well as how to continually optimize it.
“We’re pleased to see Episerver make the shift to become known as Optimizely, elevating an already well-known brand with a benefit to create, connect and optimize the customer experience across a growing number of digital channels. This move represents a differentiator for the company in the digital experience market,” said Marci Maddox, Research Director, Digital Experience Strategies, IDC. “The value optimization brings to the digital experience is often underestimated, and the new Optimizely brand gives the company an opportunity to marry creative personalization with data-driven optimization techniques. The digital experience services market is evolving quickly, and there is a significant opportunity for Optimizely to be a leader in the space with its data-driven approach to optimizing every experience along the customer journey.”
In 2020, Episerver and Optimizely recorded double-digit revenue growth, supporting go-lives for more than 250 customer including Microsoft, Atlassian, KLM, and the Wall Street Journal. The fourth quarter marked accelerated growth for both companies and their DXP offerings in particular, with Optimizely B2B Commerce Cloud and Content Cloud seeing more than 20% growth. The new Optimizely plans to hire 40+ new employees per month through the first half of 2021 to fuel their continued growth.
<h3>What’s next for Optimizely and the DXP Industry</h3>
There’s no question about it: change and consolidation are rampant in the upper echelon of the CMS and DXP marketplace. In an increasingly digital world that’s been forced to transform throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, opportunities are abundant – but competition is fierce. The winners will be able to offer more completeness of vision, not just single products or solutions. This is where Episerver and Optimizely have excelled and will continue to do so as a combined force.
While Episerver has strong awareness and a solid heritage, adopting the Optimizely name might be one of their smartest moves yet. It’s still a slick, up-and-coming brand that’s certain to give the aging CMS a shot in the arm – and allow them to shape the future of the digital customer experience.
<h3>About Optimizely (Episerver)</h3>
<a href="http://www.optimizely.com/">Optimizely</a> (Episerver) is on a mission to help people unlock their digital potential. With their leading digital experience platform (DXP), they equip teams with the tools and insights they need to create and optimize in new and novel ways. Now, companies can operate with data-driven confidence to create hyper-personalized experiences. Building sophisticated solutions has never been simpler. Optimizely’s 900+ partners and 1100+ employees in offices around the globe are proud to help more than 9,000 brands, including Toyota, Santander, eBay, KLM, and Mazda, enrich their customer lifetime value, increase revenue and grow their brands.

Episerver Rebrands as Optimizely Following Acquisition

Image showing Episerver turning to Optimizely

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While COVID-19 continues to impact markets globally, the CMS world has been on a binge of buying, partnering, and releasing new features.
In case you’ve been distracted over the last few weeks by a chaotic news cycle and a U.S. presidential election, here’s a quick recap of what’s been happening in the content management and digital experience world.
<h3>Hyland Completes Acquisition of Alfresco</h3>
<figure class="kg-card kg-image-card"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/hyland-alfresco-acquisition.jpeg" srcset="/wp-content/themes/cmscritic/img/cmscritic/content/images/size/w600/2020/11/hyland-alfresco-acquisition.jpeg 600w, /wp-content/themes/cmscritic/img/cmscritic/content/images/size/w1000/2020/11/hyland-alfresco-acquisition.jpeg 1000w, /wp-content/themes/cmscritic/img/cmscritic/content/images/2020/11/hyland-alfresco-acquisition.jpeg 1200w" /></figure>
Recently, <a href="https://www.hyland.com/">Hyland</a> the enterprise content management (ECM) provider <a href="/hyland-acquires-alfresco-focuses-on-cloud-and-global-expansion-of-enterprise-cms/">announced</a> that it had signed a definitive agreement to acquire <a href="https://www.alfresco.com/">Alfresco Software</a> – an open-source content services platform.
Last week, Hyland <a href="https://news.hyland.com/hyland-completes-acquisition-of-alfresco/">completed</a> the transaction, bringing the entire Alfresco business, including all technology and products, under the Hyland umbrella.
“At Hyland, the Alfresco platform will continue to grow and to serve customers’ evolving business needs,” said Bill Priemer, Hyland’s President and Chief Executive Office. “Alfresco customers can confidently continue to use and expand their Alfresco solutions, whether deployed on-premises or in the cloud.”
Future Alfresco versions will enable customers to seamlessly leverage other areas of the Hyland portfolio. These include the Hyland Experience Platform (HxP) — the recently launched, next-generation, cloud-based platform — and newly developed HxP components, such as <a href="https://www.hyland.com/en/platform/product-suite/HxC">Hyland Experience Capture</a>.
<h3>Episerver Completes Acquisition of Optimizely</h3>
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In a big move to evolve their personalization strategy, <a href="https://www.episerver.com/">Episerver</a>, the customer-centric digital experience platform, recently <a href="/episerver-to-acquire-optimizely-the-worlds-leading-experience-optimization-platform/">announced</a> its plans to buy <a href="https://www.optimizely.com/">Optimizely</a> – a leading A/B and multivariate testing platform. A few weeks ago, Episerver <a href="https://www.episerver.com/company/press-room/episerver-completes-acquisition-of-optimizely">completed</a> the acquisition.
“With its acquisition of Optimizely, as with its acquisitions of Idio and Insite in 2019, Episerver substantially increases the value proposition that the company offers to enterprise brands,” said Jacob Groshek, research manager, Digital Experience Management, at IDC. “The Optimizely acquisition adds AI-based experimentation and optimization to the Episerver portfolio. The purchase of Optimizely not only augments Episerver's capacity to automatically deliver personalized content as a central component of users' digital experiences, it also adds another layer of behavioral intelligence for organizations.”
Following the close, Episerver now serves approximately 9,000 customers and more than 900 partners globally in segments including retail, manufacturing &amp; distribution, financial services, insurance, healthcare, media, and technology, among others.
As part of Episerver, the Optimizely progressive delivery and experimentation platform will continue to support customers as a standalone solution, but will also be available as part of Episerver’s offerings immediately.
<h3>Acquia Announces Major Updates to Open Digital Experience Platform (DXP)</h3>
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After <a href="/acquia-launches-new-open-digital-experience-platform/">launching</a> its new Acquia Open Digital Experience Platform (DXP) this July, <a href="https://www.acquia.com/">Acquia</a> has accelerated their innovation by leaps and bounds. In fact, they recently <a href="https://www.acquia.com/about-us/newsroom/press-releases/acquia-announces-major-updates-open-digital-experience-platform">announced</a> major upgrades to their Drupal Cloud and Marketing Cloud.
So, what are these major upgrades? For starters, on the Drupal Cloud side, they <a href="https://www.acquia.com/drupal9">transitioned from Drupal 7 to Drupal 9</a>. For developers, these enhancements focus on decreasing the time to build, design, and run sites and applications.
Following the successful launch of Drupal 9 in June, the new <a href="https://www.acquia.com/drupal9/accelerate-your-migration">Acquia Migration Accelerator</a> tool significantly reduces the effort tied to a transition from Drupal 7 to Drupal 9. Currently in beta, the tool reduces time to value for Drupal 9 by providing a user-friendly interface to streamline analysis and planning, DevOps, data imports, and content auditing for migrations.
Once organizations are migrated, the new <a href="https://www.acquia.com/products/drupal-cloud/cloud-ide">Acquia Cloud IDE</a> makes it faster than ever to build Drupal sites and applications, with one-click access to a cloud-hosted development and testing environment. Acquia Cloud IDE integrates with existing Acquia command line and automated build tools for Drupal, making it faster and easier for developers to build and test their code – even in remote or hybrid work setups.
On the Marketing Cloud side, the major updates include new real-time 360-degree profiles, identity resolution, and unified segment capabilities within the Acquia Customer Data Platform (CDP). These capabilities aggregate data from various sources, eliminate redundancy, and unify data into a single source of the truth for real-time customer segmentation.
Finally, Acquia also added a COVID-19 dashboard that helps marketers understand their customers’ shifts from offline to online channels, as well as changes in channel preferences throughout the pandemic. The dashboard also helps marketers identify changes in product preferences, as well as opportunities for growth in their marketing campaigns.
<h3>Fabric Launches Headless Commerce Platform with $9.5 Million in Seed Funding</h3>
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<a href="https://fabric.inc/">Fabric</a>, a headless commerce platform, launched its cloud-native experience and commerce product suite and <a href="https://resources.fabric.inc/blog/seed">announced</a> $9.5 million in seed funding led by Redpoint Ventures with participation from Sierra Ventures and Expa. In addition, e-commerce executive Faisal Masud, who led multi-billion-dollar commerce businesses at Amazon, eBay, Groupon and Staples, has joined the company as CEO.
Brands struggle to compete with Amazon’s continued market dominance in the e-commerce and digital retail space. While big retailers can afford to invest heavily in their own proprietary systems, widening their advantage in data, speed, pricing and convenience, many D2C and B2B brands are challenged by the cost and complexity of modernizing their outdated commerce platforms. COVID-19 has further raised the stakes: during the pandemic, e-commerce sales have grown as much as 55% year-over-year.
“Unlike Amazon, which wins on selection, price and availability, emerging and growing D2C and B2B companies need to win on brand and experience,” said Faisal Masud, CEO at Fabric.
Fabric’s headless commerce platform enables marketers and merchants to deliver world-class commerce experiences without the engineering burden. Its modular API-first platform enables brands to utilize tools that address their specific needs, rather than re-platforming. Fabric gives brands sophisticated capabilities with its Experience Platform Manager (XPM), Product Information Manager (PIM), pricing and offers and Order Management (OMS).
The Fabric platform offers a suite of commerce APIs that allow brands to orchestrate their offerings across all channels, enabling them to support the entire lifecycle of each customer. In addition, Fabric runs on a completely serverless infrastructure to effectively scale during high-traffic retail peaks.
<h3>Cloudinary and Contentful Partner to Help Brands Create “Visual-First” Experiences More Efficiently</h3>
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<a href="https://cloudinary.com/">Cloudinary</a>, the media experience platform, announced a partnership with <a href="https://www.contentful.com/">Contentful</a>, a headless content management system (CMS). The new partnership offers Contentful users seamless access to Cloudinary’s award-winning media experience solutions, including its headless digital asset management (DAM) within Contentful’s CMS – allowing Contentful users to more easily upload, optimize and deliver engaging visual-first experiences at scale.
"In today's visual economy, fast and flawless rich media experiences are no longer a nice to have, they are critical components to any company’s success,” said Scott Doughman, vice president of Business Development at Cloudinary. “Equally critical is the ability to deliver the right, high-performant content as efficiently as possible to eliminate the challenges that often keep experiences from reaching their true engagement potential. The Contentful-Cloudinary integration eliminates these challenges and we’re pleased to be bringing our media management expertise to the Contentful ecosystem."
With the API-first approach of Cloudinary and Contentful, you can now build a seamlessly-integrated, future-proof stack with your preferred development frameworks and platforms.
<h3>Microsoft Announces Clarity, a Free Visitor Behavior Analytics Platform</h3>
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The elder statesman of the digital realm, <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/">Microsoft</a> continues to shock and awe the experience and development fiefdoms with bold moves – including their acquisitions of both <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/feed/">LinkedIn</a> and <a href="https://github.com/">GitHub</a>.
Now, Microsoft has announced a resource that will have an impact on digital experience in the usability, governance, and analytics categories. With <a href="https://clarity.microsoft.com/">Microsoft Clarity</a>, website and content owners will now have access to a GDPR compliant, free-to-use analytics tool to help improve their website experiences by better understanding their visitors' behaviors.
Microsoft Clarity has three main features: heatmaps, session playbacks, and an insights dashboard. Because of their unique delivery, Clarity’s tools won’t negatively impact a website's latency, and can handle variable traffic without incurring additional costs.
Clarity’s heatmaps come in two forms: clickmaps and scrollmaps. The combination will allow users to qualify behavior and trends, and make it easy to provide data-driven justifications for design decisions. The session playbacks allow site managers to record page visits and track where visitors clicked and scrolled, and the insights dashboard provides an overall understanding of the traffic to your site.
<h3>Contentsquare Acquires Dareboost And Launches Find &amp; Fix Product to Solve Revenue-Killing Errors</h3>
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<a href="https://contentsquare.com/">Contentsquare</a>, the Digital Experience Analytics (DXP Analytics) company, <a href="https://contentsquare.com/blog/contentsquare-acquires-dareboost-and-launches-find-fix-product-to-solve-revenue-killing-errors/">announced</a> its acquisition of <a href="https://www.dareboost.com/en">Dareboost</a>, an online tool to test, analyze and monitor websites. Dareboost has been a Find &amp; Fix product for Contentsquare. The integration breaks silos between marketing and IT teams, as well as the rest of a business.
The core capabilities of the new Contentsquare Find &amp; Fix product include web performance monitoring and scoring, error reporting and impact quantification, advanced retroactive search, advanced APM integrations, and comparison and benchmarking capabilities.
<h3>Mediafly Acquires Presentify to Transform Marketing and Sales Content</h3>
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<a href="https://www.mediafly.com/">Mediafly</a> – a provider of sales enablement technology, content management, and advisory services that create interactive, value-based selling experiences – <a href="https://www.mediafly.com/mediafly-acquires-presentify/">announced</a> its acquisition of <a href="https://www.presentify.co.uk/">Presentify</a>, a global visual communication solution.
By adding Presentify’s capabilities, Mediafly users can now build “selling stories” using sophisticated visual communication capabilities all through the Mediafly app – which natively supports the most advanced content formats, animations and modularized assets for elevated sales storytelling.
“More companies are recognizing the need for digital sales transformation, and the importance of using a modern sales enablement platform. But all too often they don’t want to take their antiquated, boring sales content and put it into a sophisticated sales app for fear of garbage in, garbage out,” said Carson Conant, CEO and founder of Mediafly. “With Presentify, Mediafly now tears down the barrier of entry for these companies, allowing them to quickly refresh their sales stories with interactive, animated content — and learn the ‘Presentification’ techniques to create and maintain sales collateral that is a league above their competition.”
And that’s a wrap. Stay tuned for another installment next month.

CMS Monthly Recap: Acquia Gets Feature Boosts, Cloudinary and Contentful Partner, Big Acquisition Updates and More

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