• by Jess Nelson , October 15, 2015

Email marketing is the top digital channel for return on investment, and IDC estimates marketing technology spend is expected to increase by over 12% annually to surpass $32.3 billion by 2018. StrongView and Selligent announced a merger today to address these market opportunities in the B2C marketing automation industry.

StrongView, a Redwood City-based contextual marketing company, and Selligent, a Brussels-based marketing automation and data management solution, merged today under the Selligent brand name.

This marks a major consolidation in the email marketing industry, as both StrongView and Selligent have been recognized as leaders in their fields. Selligent is the top growing marketing technology vendor, according to a recent report by VentureBeat Insights and Datanyze. StrongView is as a leader in email marketing, per Forrester Research.

Selligent CEO Andre Lejeune will stay on board as CEO of the newly merged company, while StrongView CEO Bill Wagner will become an operating partner at HGGC.

The merger also addresses global market opportunities.

Rich Lawson, CEO and managing partner of HGGC, stated that the merger addressed global market opportunities for the European and American companies. As one company, marketers will benefit from the merger with access to “a global technology platform that enables brands to recognize and act on consumers' fast-changing circumstances before, during, and after each moment of engagement.”

“As one company, we will be very well positioned to provide brands in Europe and the U.S. with efficient and effective always-on consumer-first marketing,” states Lejeune. “Our combined offering will enable brands to create rich experiences across channels and grow meaningful customer relationships over time.”

Both Selligent and StrongView are portfolio companies of HGGC, a private equity firm. Selligent announced an equity deal with HGGC in July 2015, while StrongView announced their acquisition by HGGC in September. At the time, Wagner stated that HGGC “has rich experience in marketing, customer experience, and eCommerce, and they share our vision in which companies build value through relationships that deliver value through context.”

The financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed at press time.