OpenWeb Buys Audience Platform Jeeng

Community engagement platform OpenWeb has acquired proprietary audience management platform Jeeng, for around $100m, strengthening its offer helping brands to connect with online audience across channels and devices.

OpenWeb partners with publishers and brands to build good relationships with their audiences, and 'vibrant communities rooted in healthy conversations and robust social experiences'. The firm was founded in 2015 and has more than 265 employees in New York City, Tel Aviv, Kiev, San Diego, Canada, London and Paris and has raised a total of $393m (most of it in two rounds in 2021 and October 2022), giving it a value of around $1.5 billion. In April last year it acquired Paris, France-based programmatic platform ADYOULIKE, also for $100m.

Jeeng's AI technology supports more than 650 publishers including the likes of VICE Media, The Atlantic, Crain's, HarperCollins and Vox Media, in building relationships with readers across multiple channels with hyper-personalized messaging. The company's more than 60 employees will now be integrated into OpenWeb across its NYC and Tel Aviv offices.

OpenWeb CEO and co-founder Nadav Shoval (pictured) says the buy brings his firm closer to its goal of 'OpenWeb Everywhere', allowing brands and publishers to communicate with users across 'every online platform they encounter'. CFO Haim Sasson comments: 'Users are bombarded with messages directed at them online every day, and publishers need a way to break through that noise and deliver curated content. This unified company will be the definitive partner for publishers and advertisers to move away from the walled gardens of social media and establish more thoughtful, more secure connections with audiences'. Jeeng CEO Jeff Kupietzky says the two companies are 'the perfect fit as we share the same vision', and together form 'a hyper-targeted and first-party data-rich 360 degree experience'.

Jeeng was known previously as PowerInbox and is online at www.jeeng.com . Its new owner can be found at www.openweb.com .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.