Web.com Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: WEB) has acquired the assets of Acquisio from Tandem Expansion Fund, Fonds de solidarité FTQ and Yellow Pages Digital & Media Solutions Limited (TSX: YPG). Acquisio’s investors also included Emerillon Capital, and Wellington Financial which provided undisclosed amount venture debt.
Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. On March 9, 2016, Web.com paid US $341 million for Yodle, Inc., a provider of cloud based local marketing solutions for small businesses with approximately 1,400 employees and 53,000 subscribers at the time of acquisition.
[mepr-active rule=”374″ ifallowed=”hide”]★Subscribe to read our research and comments on this and other deals. We offer monthly or yearly recurring or one-time trial subscriptions. Subscribe today and see what you have been missing and be in the know! ★[/mepr-active][mepr-active rule=”374″]As in the case of $2.2 million acquisition by Mediagrif Interactive Technologies of the assets of Orckestra Inc. (Orckestra had raised over $20 million from Fondaction, Fonds de solidarité and other Quebec VC investors), this exit does not provide any meaningful returns. Web.com paid US $7.5 million for the assets. Tandem Expansion, the largest shareholder, led a $12.1 million round in 2011. Fonds de solidarité, the second largest shareholder ahead of Yellow Pages, had invested $4.93 million in the company. Yellow Pages acquired a then 24% stake in Acquisio in April 2009. [/mepr-active]
Founded in 2003, Brossard, Quebec based Acquisio provides software that facilitates customer acquisition using ad platforms such as Google AdWords, Facebook Ads, and Bing Ads. Small business owners and small business reseller’s benefit from Acquisio’s advanced data science tools to automate, optimize, and scale most of the processes involved in acquiring new customers online.
Jacksonville, Florida based Web.com Group is a global provider of a full range of Internet services to small businesses to help them compete and succeed online.
“Acquisio makes available to small and midsized businesses the same powerful machine-learning technology that was once available only to the largest corporations and online marketing agencies,” said David L. Brown, Web.com’s chairman, CEO and president. “By applying Acquisio’s award-winning artificial intelligence technology to Web.com’s existing suite of online marketing tools and its hands-on, consultative approach, we will be able to provide even greater value to customers at a much faster pace. We are thrilled to welcome the entire Acquisio team to the Web.com family.”
“Headquartered in North America’s up and coming talent hub for artificial intelligence – Montreal, Canada – Acquisio is well positioned to pioneer innovation with Web.com. Montreal is renowned for software development, and in recent years has become a nucleus for artificial intelligence and deep learning innovation. We are proud to leverage our artificial intelligence for small businesses around the world,” said Marc Poirier, Acquisio’s CEO and co-founder.
photo credit: Acquisio