Retriever continued the industry consolidation trend in the Nordics. June also saw funding news and big tech acquisitions. Meanwhile, summer has arrived in the northern hemisphere, and we have summer reading all sorted with reports from Reuters Institute, IPR and Brunswick. (Don’t forget about Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends report.)
Retriever acquires Relation Desk
Retriever has acquired the social media engagement platform Relation Desk for an undisclosed sum. Retriever, a Nordic media intelligence leader, plans to integrate the Relation Desk offering with its existing news and social media listening and analytics tools.
CreatorIQ picks up $US12 million
CreatorIQ has raised $US12 million in series B funding from three investors – Unilever, TVC Capital and Affinity Group. The influencer marketing platform company, will use the funds to accelerate the growth of AI-enabled software intended to ensure brand safety. Unilever’s Vasiliki Petrou stated “CreatorIQ is proactively developing solutions that empower Unilever to continue to set global measurement standards for the influencer marketing industry.”
West Corp is now Intrado
West Corporation has announced that it is rebranding to a new company name, Intrado. The news comes with the announcement that it is re-oranising it’s operations into four segments: Life & Safety, Enterprise Collaboration, Digital Media, and Health & Wellness. Among other offerings, Digital Media will house GlobalNewswire and the recently acquired Notified. Earlier this month, the company launched Unison an end-to-end communications workflow and insight solution.
Google, Salesforce & Twitter make acquisitions
June saw three significant acquisitions. First off, Salesforce bought Tableau, the popular data integration tool, for a whopping $US15.7 billion. Google acquired Looker for $US2.6 billion to support analytics on its cloud business. Twitter picked up Fabula AI for an undisclosed sum. The London-based start-up’s machine learning technology will be leveraged by Twitter to “improve the health of the conversation”.
IPR explores disinformation
In case you’re wondering why Twitter needs to improve the health of conversations, the Institute for PR (IPR) might have some answers. According to a new study, 55% of people think that Twitter is at least “somewhat” responsible for the spread of disinformation. The 2019 IPR Disinformation in Society Report surveyed 2,200 adults in the US to determine the prevalence of disinformation, and who’s responsible. (Spoiler alert: Twitter’s not the only responsible organisation named in the report.)
Reuters Institute reports on news consumption
Disinformation is a global theme picked up in this year’s Reuters News Report. In Brazil, 85% agree with a statement that they are worried about what is real and fake on the internet. Concern is also high in the UK (70%) and US (67%), but much lower in Germany (38%) and the Netherlands (31%). The report also explores how messaging apps are being used for news, raising further concerns over misinformation. The report covers new insights about digital news consumption based on a survey of over 75,000 online news consumers in 38 countries, and is always worth the read.
Brunswick defines new expectations for CEOs
CEOs have always been expected to communicate information. However, the channels they are using to communicate are not always reflecting their stakeholders. The Brunswick Group’s Connected Leadership report explores why a digital presence is critical for CEOs, and just what CEOs are now expected to report on. The report is based on surveys in both the UK and US.
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