EMEA-based B2B demand generation Expandi has announced the successful purchase of B2B intent-insight data platform, Cyance, through the support of ReSolve, a boutique business advisory, restructuring and investment practice.

Cyance seeks to help innovative and fast-growing B2B companies and large, global enterprises generate more efficient growth, particularly for those targeting European markets. With a product offering in European language and intent-data coverage, Cyance analyses global data from over 55,000 sources and tracks over 24 billion data events each month.

In June 2022, ReSolve was engaged by Cyance to run an accelerated sale process. As the only other European intent-data provider capable of delivering data based on local media and language, Cyance was the ideal candidate.

The acquisition of several of Cyance’s assets not only enhances Expandi’s martech solution, but also seeks to deliver the best global intent-data solution.

Simon Jagger, partner at ReSolve and administrator for Cyance, commented: “We are very pleased to have secured a buyer for certain of the assets of Cyance in a short timeframe. This is the ideal outcome where a well-capitalised and forward-thinking peer has seen the value in Cyance’s assets and has decided to enhance its position within the market through an acquisition. This will benefit all stakeholders and customers.”
 
Raffaele Apostoliti, CEO at Expandi, added: “We are thrilled to have concluded this deal. This now makes Expandi the only European company with a comprehensive and global intent-solution for B2B  markets. Thank you to ReSolve for making the transaction as seamless and efficient as possible.”

We asked our Propolis Hive Experts Karla Wentworth, Marketing Operations and Process, and Tony Lamb, Data, Insight and Intelligence to reflect on what this means for the wider market.

Karla said: This is further evidence of something we have been forecasting for a while; consolidation in the vast martech universe. With nearly 10,000 providers, it’s highly likely that we will see more of these kinds of events.

The result is a comprehensive player in the European market for Intent, which is so often US-dominated. The jury is still out for me on the true power of Intent data and time will tell if we see further growth, consolidation or both in fast-moving this part of the martech world.”

Tony added: “Cyance had been seeking inward investment for some time, though ultimately this was unsuccessful. In June 2022, ReSolve was engaged by Cyance to run an accelerated sale process, seeking urgent investment to further develop the business or a sale of the business and/or its assets. Expandi were the chosen acquirer, and on paper this looks a very nice strategic move for Expandi. 

It extends their data reach, and also clientbase. In the Intent space, having more and varied sources of relevant data is always better in building a clearer picture of what’s going on to identify the organisations that are really in-market for products and services. Many companies are already using multiple intent data sources to reinforce this point

On a wider market perspective, it will be interesting to see how the changes in privacy enforcement and cookies impact the wider Intent data market. 

We are certainly going to see 3rd party data becoming more anonymised, but it will still enable marketers to identify behaviors, and target with reasonable precision. Advancements through Web 3.0 will also open up new technical capabilities, particularly as a lot of Intent Data are based on pretty simplistic logic

These market insights should therefore become more granular than those currently available, to more accurately identify which organisations are really in-market for products/services

Overall, there will be a lot of change in this market space. If that requires additional investment, some organisations may not be able to move with the market, so more consolidation and mergers can be expected. 

Alternatively, if there’s new innovation and growth in the market, it becomes an attractive acquisition opportunity for organisations looking to broaden their offering

Watch this space!”