ACL Digital acquires AFour Technologies, Yahoo selects AWS, more CX news.
ACL Digital, an ALTEN group company, has announced that it acquired AFour Technologies, a software product engineering firm. In a statement, company officials said the acquisition of the AFour Technologies will enable ACL Digital to accelerate digital transformation.
“This acquisition helps us expand and strengthen our deep digital product engineering capabilities across various verticals we operate,” Ramandeep Singh, CEO of ACL Digital, said in a statement. “Together, we will create world-class solutions with AFour Technologies to empower our clients to streamline their operation, enhance their customer experience, compete better in the marketplace, and drive meaningful value to their customers, businesses, and employees.”
In other CX news…
Yahoo Selects AWS as Its Preferred Public Cloud Provider for Its Ad Tech Business
Amazon Web Services (AWS), an Amazon.com, Inc. company, has announced that Yahoo has selected AWS as its preferred public cloud provider for its advertising technology business Yahoo Ad Tech. The announcement was made At AWS re:Invent this week.
According to company officials, Yahoo Ad Tech is migrating all of its advertising technology workloads, including its media-buying and supply-side platforms, analytics and identity solutions and products, from its on-premises data centers to AWS. The migration is part of the business’s ongoing strategy to reduce IT infrastructure costs, transform its advertising business operations and develop more tailored and immersive solutions.
“By harnessing the power of AWS, we’ll be able to move faster and give our customers what they value most — advertising solutions that provide the right combination of performance, audiences and revenue growth,” Aaron Lake, senior vice president of platforms engineering and chief information officer at Yahoo, said in a statement. “Running all of Yahoo Ad Tech on AWS provides us with a broad portfolio of world-class services that will allow us to help advertisers achieve the returns they want by providing them with precise audience targeting, while our ad publisher customers are able to scale and monetize their ad space.”
In other Yahoo news, the company announced it has entered into a 30-year agreement with Taboola, a web advertising company. In a statement, company officials said Taboola will exclusively power native advertising across all of Yahoo’s digital properties and will be available to buy through the Yahoo DSP. The agreement, which has been approved by the Boards of Directors of both companies, is expected to close in the first quarter of 2023.
“Yahoo is an internet pioneer, representing one of the largest, most trusted and most sophisticated publishers in the world,” Adam Singolda, founder and CEO of Taboola, said in a statement. “Everywhere I look, I see a rocket ship growth opportunity for both of us — native, eCommerce, Video, header bidding (display) and more.”
Cognizant to Acquire AustinCSI
Cognizant, a professional services company, has announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire AustinCSI, a digital consultancy specializing in enterprise cloud and data analytics advisory services. Company officials said the acquisition will enrich its advisory capabilities for digital strategy, and the transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2022, subject to satisfaction of closing conditions.
“Client demand for end-to-end digital strategy and industry-specific solutions continues to accelerate,” Michael Valocchi, senior VP and head of Cognizant Consulting and Americas strategy, said in a statement. “AustinCSI has built a stellar reputation by improving business outcomes for some of the world’s most recognizable brands, particularly in the telecommunications, media, technology and automotive sectors, markets where Cognizant is also strong. We look forward to welcoming AustinCSI’s talented experts to our team and further enriching the value we’re providing to our clients as they embrace cloud, AI, data analytics, and other advancing technologies.”
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Avid Promotes Deb Sanders to Chief Customer Officer
Avid, a technology and multimedia company, has announced the promotion of technology services executive Deb Sanders to the role of chief customer officer & senior vice president to lead worldwide operations for customer success, customer care, advocacy, learning and overall CX, as well as oversee collaboration with the customer-led Avid Community Association.
Company officials said Sanders joined Avid as VP of global customer care in 2019 with responsibility for the vision, strategy and tactical plans. She earned her MS in technology commercialization from the University of Texas, McCombs School of Business, and her BS in chemical engineering from the University of New Mexico.
“Deb naturally inspires confidence from our customers and motivates our teams. I’m thrilled that we can promote our proven talent while we continue Avid’s growth through subscription delivery and expansion of our SaaS offerings and cloud deployments for the world’s media creators,” Jeff Rosica, Avid’s CEO and president, said in a statement.
Channel99 Gains $5M and Announces Debuts With New App
Channel99, a B2B marketing company, earned $5 million in seed funding led by San Francisco-based Jackson Square Ventures (JSV). The company also announced its debut with free mobile app that enables marketers to benchmark the performance of their digital channels against industry averages.
“Many people don’t realize that more than 90% of activity driven to a B2B website provides little to no value when it comes to driving new business,” Chris Golec, founder of Channel99, said in a statement. “With investments across hundreds of vendors and channels, the industry desperately needs a single source of truth to consistently measure the efficacy of their efforts. That’s exactly what Channel99 provides — transparency to pinpoint what’s working and what’s not.”
