The trend covered in my post “Private equity is eating the Sales Enablement and Sales Engagement part of the MarTech market” is continuing:
19-Sep-2022: FLEX Capital acquired a majority stake in ComX ComX.io “ComX.io AI for Sales”. Commercial Excellence GmbH. Berlin, Germany. Cape Town, Western Cape, ZA. South Africa
20-Sep-2022: Sydney-based private equity firm, Potentia, is betting on Australian ASX-listed but US-centered, Nitro PDF. […] Nitro is an Australian version of the ubiquitous Adobe PDF software. In announcing its rejection of Potentia’s bid, Nitro claimed the $400M offer doesn’t adequately compensate shareholders for Nitro’s position as one of only two software companies worldwide with a proven enterprise-grade SaaS PDF productivity & eSigning platform, and a uniquely powerful & differentiated solution offering in a fast-growing global market worth $US28Bn.
[…] a new product called ‘Docs to Decks’ that enables you to write your content in Canva Docs – and with one click, it will be converted into a beautiful presentation. […]
The following table highlights how private equity is eating Sales Enablement / MarTech. Also see my database of 777 line items
| Private Equity ($43M) from Invictus Growth Partners Invictus Growth Management LLC (26-Jul-2022): Allbound allbound.com @allbound |
| EQT (EQT Partners AB): Sitecore sitecore.com (Boxever, STYLELABS, Moosend) |
| FLEX Capital acquired a majority stake in ComX ComX.io “ComX.io AI for Sales” |
| Adobe: Adobe Experience Cloud / AEM / Marketo / ToutApp / Workfront |
| Cincom Systems cincom.com TeamSync CPQ Sync |
| Canva canva.com Magic Write / Magic Design. Record & download “talking presentations”. Edit video: Canva Video suite. ‘Docs to Decks’. Canva Visual Worksuite |
| SAP (Callidus, iCentera, Litmos LMS, Emarsys, Signavio) CRM, CPQ, CLM |
| Alphabet: Google Bard (AI) / Google Cloud Platform (G Suite / Drive / Docs / Sheets / Slides / Keep / Forms / Sites / Currents/Spaces) |
| Meta (Metaverse, Oculus / Reality Labs / Project Cambria / Meta Quest Pro! / Workplace by Facebook, Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, etc) |
| Sprinklr Inc. also known as Demand Media, Inc. Sprinklr Modern Marketing; CMS |
| Asana for Marketing, Asana Operations & Asana for Sales & Account Management |
| Permira permira.com: Nu:Pitch became Seismic: Seismic (SAVO / SAVO Group, KnowledgeTree, Zensight, Percolate, Grapevine6, Lessonly [Obie acquired by Lessonly 29-Jul-2021]) |
| ZoomInfo Technologies (Predecessor DiscoverOrg) TellWise, Clickagy AI, Komiko, Chorus.ai, EverString |
| ServiceNow, Inc. (Attivio, Loom Systems, Passage AI, Sweagle, Montrêal-based Element AI) |
| Dropbox building a metaverse. Dropbox Paper, Dropbox for Business (HelloSign, DocSend docsend.com) |
| Salesforce CRM CMS / Sites / Content / Chatter / Quip / Einstein / AppExchange / Trailhead / Slack / LevelJump formerly Lurniture / Salesforce Genie / Genie for Tableau / MuleSoft / Slack Genie / Einstein AI & Flow automation |
| Microsoft: Microsoft Designer / Microsoft Office / Teams / SharePoint / Dynamics / Azure / Delve / Xbox / Mesh / Loop / Yammer / Skype / LinkedIn (PointDrive) LinkedIn Learning / Viva Sales seller’s companion to CRM working in productivity apps like Outlook & Teams w. integrations to Dynamics 365 Sales & Salesforce CRM |
| Atlassian Corporation Plc: Confluence Cloud, Trello, etc (doctape.com tape.io @doctapers / Percept.AI former Buddy AI) |
| NICE nice.com @NICELtd NICE Ltd / NICE Systems Ltd. (ContentEngine / MindTouch @MindTouch) |
| Axway axway.com (Atos [Unify unify.com Circuit by Unify will be sunset Dec-2022] bluekiwi.io bluekiwi-software.com acquired by Atos) |
| Private Equity Firm HGGC, LLC invested in Upland uplandsoftware.com: Altify, Kapost, RO|innovation, Qvidian (Sant & Kadient), BlueVenn, Objectif Lune Inc. objectiflune.com, BA-Insight Inc. |
| Clearlake Capital Group, L.P. [Cornerstone OnDemand, Inc. (EdCast)] |
| Zoom zoom.us @Zoom acquisition of Solvvy solvvy.com @solvvyinc to strengthen conversational AI capabilities & launched Zoom IQ for sales. In December 2020, Zoom announced the acquisition of Keybase, a secure messaging & file-sharing service. 14-Apr-2023, Zoom announced plans to acquire Workvivo |
| Ziff Davis, Inc was J2 Global, Inc (Landslide Technologies Inc / CampaignerCRM / Campaigner campaigner.com @CampaignerEmail) |
| ESW Capital Group: Aurea, Inc. (Jive Software / XANT, Inc. XANT.ai [now once again insidesales.com] PLAYBOOKS) |
| Insight Partners: Optimizely rebranded Episerver Inc [Insite Software acquired Storyworks Ondemand/Storyworks1 optimizely.com acquired Insite]) |
| TA Associates: Revalize revalizesoftware.com @revalize acquired Sofon Solutions sofon.com @SofonSoftware @SofonDE Sofon Guided Solutions |
| Thoma Bravo private equity firm: Bridge @GetBridge getbridge.com by instructure.com @Instructure / Conga conga.com (Octiv [formerly TinderBox]) acquired by Apttus apttus.com |
| Vista Equity Partners: ACQUIA INC acquia.com (Widen Enterprises, Inc. widen.com), SalesLoft (Costello, Noteninja), Drift drift.com (@GiantOtterTech AI), Pipedrive pipedrive.com (Mailigen) Sales Docs, Khoros (Lithium Technologies, LLC / Lithium Technologies [Jive Software]) |
| TPG private investment firm: Nintex (Drawloop Technologies / K2) |
| opentext.com acquired Documentum / Dell EMC’s Enterprise Content Division. The product originally called Livelink became an OpenText flagship product |
| Showpad (LearnCore, LIA, Voicefox, Hickup, Taptera) |
| Oracle CPQ Cloud former BigMachines Inc + InQuira / Oracle Netsuite configure, price, & quote (CPQ) = Netsuite CPQ for sales teams |
| Dialpad dialpad.com @Dialpad acquired TalkIQ @Talk_iq |
| Gong.io (Vayo, ONDiGO) |
| 6sense.com @6senseInc 6sense Insights, Inc. acquired Slintel slintel.com @Slintel_Inc as well as Granite Media, Saleswhale, Fortella, ZenIQ.io |
| Demand Science: PureB2B, Klarity, Internal Results, Leadiro [B2B sales enablement, sales intelligence & data enrichment platform], Tidings, BIOMES, airborne app |
| Coveo coveo.com (Qubit. qubit.com) |
| Sumeru Equity Partners: Former SocialChorus |
| Bigtincan bigtincan.com: [Contondo, FatStax, Zunos, Veelo (mobilepaks), Asdeq Labs, XINN, Agnitio, Clearslide (SlideRocket), VoiceVibes, Vidinoti, Brainshark] probably not buying LiveTiles Ltd livetilesglobal.com |
Latest acquisition on my entire market overview of 777 vendors: 24-Sep-2022
Ciara GmbH getciara.com @getciara all-in-one conversation assistant who brings all your skills together, focuses on work so you can focus on results, & levels up your game. Virtual assistant for inside sales reps / inside sales teams. Provides interactive guides, proven playbooks, & smart objection handling, helping them to structure their phone conversations & increase their success & productivity. With the best questions & best answers during your sales calls Ciara makes you an inside sales rockstar – right away. Outside sales is still around, but compared to inside sales it is trending down. Ciara will be able to understand a conversation in full & will provide real-time sales enablement skills to inside sales reps. Sales professionals spend just 34% of their time selling. They spend the rest of their time with data entry, quote generation, & other tasks. And these tasks keep them away from customers. The Ciara platform is being driven by the success of AI & real-time communications currently used by virtual assistants. With the playbook in place, reps can answer customer questions on competition, pricing, & new product capabilities quickly. The more you use it, the better it gets by using deep learning from daily interactions. Inside sales is growing because of the way consumers & businesses now interact with technology. When someone wants to buy a product or service, the first thing they do is search for it online. By the time they have made the decision to buy, they have all the information they need. In most cases, they make the first contact. Whether it is through email, chat or a phone call, this contact is made to an inside sales rep. How the rep responds will dictate if the customer is going to move forward with the purchase. This highlights the importance of proper training & having the right tools in place. Founded Date: 2019. 
Munich, Germany. Ciara joins forces with Unique! 11-Apr-2022, Unique acquired Ciara for an undisclosed amount. Together we are on the fast track to become the global leader in real-time conversation & sales intelligence. UNIQUE unique.ch Unique AG, Zürich, Switzerland. Unique platform: Reinvents sales for the era of remote working & beyond. The more time you invest in sales conversations, the more deals you can win. Summarizing a sales pitch, updating CRM, onboarding new employees, coaching existing employees – all of this is time-consuming. But essential at the same time. Imagine these tasks being done for you automatically. That’s exactly what Unique does & much more! Unique’s AI-driven sales platform records & analyses sales conversations delivering real-time insights & coaching to sales teams helping them win more deals. Helps salespeople & customers understand each other better & build deeper, more meaningful relationships. Meeting Agenda & Real-Time Coaching: Structure your calls & stay consistent during on- & offline client conversations with an AI-driven meeting agenda. See what topics you covered, & what to mention next thanks to real-time coaching insights. Venture-backed B2B SaaS sales intelligence platform, transforming sales by empowering both sales teams & customers. Unique leverages the power of AI to augment sales teams with real-time coaching and insights to close more deals & build better customer partnerships; & to give customers a better, more transparent, informed buying experience.
Recent addition to my specific list for the Nordics:
Breyta breyta.io @breytaHQ SaaS startup: Innovative CRM tool. CRM as it should be: Powerful & collaborative workspace for modern GTM teams to accelerate revenue across the entire customer lifecycle. Go beyond lead scoring so you can reach the right accounts at the right time with the right message. With our templates, you’ll be up & running within minutes. Collaborate across the customer journey: Deliver personalized experiences across touchpoints throughout your customers’ lifecycle. Move away from transactional sales & towards relationships where everyone works together to make the customer successful, no matter their job title. Aiming to bring more data-driven decisions to collaborative teams, boosting their success. Data & interactions are becoming more and more siloed & fragmented. Breyta is aiming to address this, by building a CRM that lets revenue teams collaborate together to generate more bookings & expansions with more & better data at their fingertips. The Norwegian startup announced seed funding led by Peak out of Amsterdam, Snö Ventures & Sondo out of Norway & existing investors. Brings the total raised by the company (founded 2021) to over €7M. Breyta AS, Nadderudveien 145B, 1359, Eiksmarka / Oslo, Norway
Rebranding on my list for India:
Journey Sales JourneyDXP journeysales.com journeydxp.com @JourneySales smart rooms digitally engage customers with sales teams across the customer lifecycle, allowing them to easily collaborate – all in Salesforce.com. B2B sales solution designed for you & your customer. Smart Rooms are private digital collaboration spaces where a sales team & a customer team can work together, engage key decision-makers, invite colleagues, quickly reach consensus etc. Say goodbye to repeat conversations, endless emailing & unproductive phone calls & say hello to everyone on the same page. Once had $5.8M in revenue annually. Competes with Abtech Holdings. Journey Sales is now JourneyDXP. Although we started by targeting sales, our customers 
began to apply Smart Rooms to a variety of use cases that cross sales, marketing, & account management. A great customer experience is essential to modern sales success. By changing our name from Journey Sales to JourneyDXP, we’re underscoring the larger value of our products & services as components of a comprehensive digital experience platform designed to offer enterprise-wide benefits for teams. JourneyDXP continues to add new innovations to our Smart Rooms solution enabling client-facing end-users to improve engagement with prospects, clients, & fellow team members. Add to these innovations an expanded line of strategic coaching services to help B2B organizations embrace virtual selling & other digital-first business strategies, & JourneyDXP is changing the landscape of digital customer engagement, & unifying sales, marketing, success, account management, & channel partner teams in their efforts to build profitable pipelines & remain competitive in their space. Empower your team with a best-in-class digital sales solution to engage smarter & win more. Philadelphia, PA, USA & Chandigarh, Chandigarh, India
Further market updates:
Pressly pressly.com @pressly Empower your team with a new kind of sales enablement platform. Supply your sales team with engaging content that drives measurable business results. Surface useful content: Generate a constant supply of relevant content company-wide with the help of your research, marketing & product teams. Share suggested original & 3rd-party content into a private hub Alert sales to new content with regular newsletter digests. Let them choose content that relates best to their customer audience, then republish it to personal sales & private advisor hubs. Share new content to all levels of your sales funnel with newsletter updates & updates via social media. useful metrics derived from customer & sales advisor behaviour, helping you to optimise content even further. Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Sep. 7, 2017, Vision Critical @visioncritical announced its acquisition of Pressly @pressly a Toronto-based software company. 
Vision Critical provides customer relationship intelligence software that improves customer relationships to grow customer lifetime value. Vancouver, Canada. Alida alida.com @AlidaTXM created a CXM & Insights Platform. The company is based in Toronto and formerly known as Vision Critical. Alida Inc. formerly known as Vision Critical Communications Inc.
Moxo moxo.com @PoweredByMoxo modernize your client interaction workflows with your OneStop Client Interaction Hub. 11-Jul-2022, Client interaction workflow solution Moxo teamed up with Kasisto kasisto.com @kasistoinc the creators of financial services digital experience platform KAI, to provide digital assistant capabilities within Moxo’s OneStop Client Interaction Hub. The integration between Moxo & Kasisto means financial institutions (FIs) can streamline their client interactions across segments & uses cases. KAI will handle the initial product & 
service inquiries with intelligent digital assistants, & will escalate conversations requiring high-touch human interaction to the bank or FI via Moxo. Kasisto’s digital assistants, powered by the KAI conversational artificial intelligence (AI) platform, are the first digital banking assistants to be integrated within Moxo. The combined services provide an end-to-end client interaction solution for financial services. Embedded within Moxo’s Live Chat module & connected to the financial services ecosystem, KAI will handle the first level of client questions that don’t need to be answered by a human. When more complex questions can’t be answered by KAI, the digital banking assistant will escalate the conversation to a live service representative within Moxo’s Live Chat Module in real-time. Cupertino, CA, USA
RevSure.AI revsure.ai @RevSure Revenue Operations Analytics & Insights beyond the CRM. Build your Pipeline Muscle & Accelerate Revenue Growth. AI-based solution: View of the pipeline with proactive intelligence for faster lead-to-opportunity conversions to achieve better revenue predictability. RevSure.AI Inc. Palo Alto, CA, USA. Kodihalli, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
AlphaSales alphasales.ai @MichalLipka Pre-Launch Startup. Digital notebook with personal assistance for sales professionals. Sales meetings can be overwhelming, especially if you’re involved in complex or scientific sales. We’re developing a digital notebook with personal assistance aimed towards sales & business development professionals to help you conduct more efficient & effective meetings. London, England
Falkon AI falkon.ai @falkon_ai falkonai.com revenue analytics & acceleration. Measure & improve what really matters. Win more. Together. Intelligence platform for the entire Go To Market (GTM) team: marketing, sales, & account management. Sales analytics platform that uses AI to attempt to show where successful product sales are occuring in an organization. Falkon was started in 2020 as an augmented analytics company to improve business operations through analysis & automation. It raised $20M & is building integrations with workflow partners, support product research & expanding from 20 to 30 employees. The platform tries to unify a company’s go-to-market data (eg product usage metrics, CRM customer relationship management & sales enablement data & web traffic), de-duplicating the info & generating data-driven recommendations for sales & marketing teams – specifically sales development representatives, account executives & account managers. Uncover stuck sales pipelines & find new opportunities! Connect business intelligence tools to the platform to do reporting on customer accounts, contacts & channel data! Insights are delivered via Slack, email & embedded apps in services from Salesforce & other vendors; Falkon can automate workflows like enrollment in marketing campaigns & Salesforce task creation. Seattle, WA, USA
Winn AI winn.ai @Winn_sales a real-time AI assistant that helps sales teams save time on busywork & Win more deals. AI-powered assistant designed to help sales teams automatically track, capture, & update CRM entries. Winn.AI monitors sales calls and records key data, in theory reducing the need for salespeople to note-take themselves. Links with Salesforce, HubSpot, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, & Google Meet. In addition to updating CRM records in real-time, the platform also proactively provides information about topics discussed by customers. Winn.AI Labs Ltd. Tel Aviv, Israel
- Complete table (777 line items) to export yourself
- Global list / companies worldwide – Canadian list
- European list – UK / Republic of Ireland based – Germany based – France based – Swiss – Dutch/Netherlands – companies/vendors from the Nordics
- Australian list – New Zealand based companies
- Israel based companies
- India based (or development in India)
- Sales Enablement market deathwatch
- DIY (do it yourself) No Code & b2c tools
- Brand monitoring tools used in the Sales Enablement market
- Metaverse mixed reality VR / AR / 2D / 3D based tools
- SaaS Sales Enablement & CRM Software for b2b startups or small teams
- Sales Enablement powered by ML Machine Learning & AI
B2B Sales Enablement and Sales Tech SaaS 