IBM snaps up Silverpop for £180m

IBM is bolstering its attack on the marketing industry by acquiring email and marketing automation specialist Silverpop, in a deal estimated to be worth up to $300m (£179m).
The move follows Adobe’s $600m (£393m) acquisition of marketing automation company Neolane and Salesforce’s $2.5bn (£1.6bn) deal for ExactTarget. Meanwhile in 2012 Teradata bought eCircle and Oracle bought cloud marketing company Eloqua for $871m (£519m).
Just last month IBM also invested $100m (£60m) to expand its data-driven capabilities and consulting strategy.
According to a statement from IBM, the combination of its own enterprise marketing portfolio with Silverpop’s real-time personalisation technology will create a complete and advanced customer engagement solution for businesses of all sizes and scenarios.
“The acquisition of Silverpop turbocharges IBM’s ability to put the customer at the center of any organization,” says Craig Hayman, cloud services general manager at IBM. “Now, nearly any marketing, commerce, or customer service professional from any business will have the ability to deliver the kinds of personalized customer experiences that make a measurable impact on the brand experience and the bottom line.”
The Silverpop acquisition, if approved by regulators, is expected to be complete by mid-2014.