Dow Jones sues Cision 
Cision’s exclusive partnership with Dow Jones appears to be coming to an end. Less than a year after the agreement was signed, Dow Jones has issued court proceedings. According to the filing, Cision sent Dow Jones an email stating that Cision would “suspend further payments to Dow Jones” because “Cision has lost ~$6.5M on th[e] relationship” and unilaterally concluded that “the partnership is not economically viable” for Cision. In response, Dow Jones has issued a lawsuit to recover the $USD 173.6 million that Cision agreed to pay for the exclusive content over eight years. It appears that Cision has not publicly responded, and continues to promote its Dow Jones content.
Retriever merges with Infomedia
In news from Denmark, Retriever is merging with Infomedia. It is hoped that the merged business will create the scale to further develop their products. It’s a reflection of the continuing innovation that is required by all media intelligence companies to compete in an increasingly global marketplace. The merger does rather limit local supplier options for Danish companies, but it should deliver a robust service for the future.
Meltwater partners on misinformation
Regular readers know how interested we are in identifying and tracking misinformation and disinformation in the media. Meltwater has announced a strategic partnership with Blackbird.AI, the provider of narrative and risk intelligence. The intention of the partnership is to help protect customers from misinformation and disinformation that cause reputational and financial harm. Meltwater has been busy adding partners to its partner ecosystem this year.
Influencer platform acquisitions
July saw two acquisitions in the the influencer marketing space. First off, Publicis Groupe has entered into an agreement to acquire Influential in a deal worth $USD 500 million. Influential runs a network of more than 3.5 million creators, including 90% of the global influencers who have 1 million followers or more. Meanwhile, Stagwell has acquired the Tel Aviv-based LEADERS and its InfluencerMarketing.AI (IMAI), a global influencer marketing platform. The platform joins Stagwell Marketing Cloud’s PRophet Comms Tech Suite of AI-powered offerings purpose-built for modern PR and marketing professionals.
Reddit restricts access
The post-IPO world of Reddit is continuing apace, as the company has restricted some search engines from indexing the site. The exception is Google, with which Reddit has a financial agreement. Social listening providers, meanwhile, have been announcing new deals with Reddit, with Talkwalker adding the Reddit firehose to its offering this month.
Media Intelligence Product Updates
Here are some of the product announcements that caught our attention this month:
Talkwalker has broadened its Reddit offering. The social listening platform is now sourcing data and content via Reddit’s Data API – effectively, Reddit’s firehose.
Not really product news, but Meltwater has launched its new advertising campaign, with a video created by 1000heads out of Australia.
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