SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire privately held Efficient Frontier, a leader in multi-channel ad buying and optimization. Adobe solutions are central to how digital marketing and advertising is created, managed, executed, measured and optimized. Adobe currently captures approximately five trillion digital transactions per year for more than 5,000 customers, including many of the world’s largest advertisers, publishers and advertising agencies.
The acquisition of Efficient Frontier will add multi-channel ad campaign forecasting, execution and optimization capabilities to Adobe’s existing Digital Marketing Suite. Along with the Suite, Adobe’s digital marketing capabilities include an enterprise-class data management platform, a leading video ad management and monetization platform, and an enterprise content management system. Adobe will continue to build upon the foundation of its independent ad buying and optimization platform for search, social and display, enabling the company to offer a more complete suite of capabilities to digital marketers, advertisers and publishers for reporting and analytics, personalized experiences, multi-channel campaign management and media monetization.
“With the explosion in global Internet advertising, our customers need to know where, when and how to spend their digital marketing dollars to get the greatest return,” said Brad Rencher, senior vice president and general manager of Adobe’s Digital Marketing Business. “The addition of Efficient Frontier will give our Digital Marketing Suite customers a leading platform for turning ad spend into business impact.”
“Adobe’s vision of digital marketing is perfectly aligned with the Efficient Frontier approach — use data and intelligence to manage risk and drive ROI across a growing number of digital channels,” said David Karnstedt, president and CEO, Efficient Frontier. “Adobe customers will have greater insight into how their social, search and display spend impact one another and how to optimize their cross-channel campaigns.”
Social Marketing
Efficient Frontier will bring to Adobe a
social ad buying capability for Facebook, which leverages Efficient
Frontier’s optimization algorithms to predict results and drive greater
ROI. Additionally, a marketer can upload various creative elements into
the solution and it will automatically generate ad combinations. These
capabilities will be integrated with the Facebook ad buying
functionality currently available with Adobe®
SearchCenter+.
The acquisition will also bring a social marketing engagement platform, offering customers tools and services to help them build, manage, monitor and measure their brand presence across the social web. Adobe will combine this social engagement capability with Adobe SocialAnalytics, an analytics solution that moves beyond social monitoring to tie social media to business results.
Search Marketing
The Adobe Digital Marketing Suite features
a paid search management solution, SeachCenter+. Efficient Frontier will
extend this search capability with a complementary search portfolio
optimization system. These solutions will be combined, creating a
market-leading search optimization solution that scales from mid-market
to the largest enterprises and agencies.
Display Marketing
Efficient Frontier brings its experience
in search optimization to display advertising with a real-time bidding
system to increase ad performance on major display inventory sources.
This bidding system utilizes Efficient Frontier’s algorithms, which will
learn using site traffic and conversion data from the Adobe Digital
Marketing Suite, and will complement the Adobe Dynamic Ad Targeting
solution which dynamically generates display ads with personalized
messaging and offers. The integration of Efficient Frontier and Adobe
Digital Marketing Suite capabilities will give customers a more complete
view of their display advertising campaigns and provide a unified
ad-to-site optimization system to increase qualified clicks and
conversion rates.
Multi-Channel Optimization
The auction-based buying process
for search, display and social media puts marketers under pressure to
decide what and where to bid. Efficient Frontier takes the guesswork out
of the process by using an algorithmic approach to generate optimized
bids and allocate budget across digital channels for maximum return on
investment. The customizable algorithms are built on the marketer’s
historical performance data from the search, display, and social
marketplaces as well as conversion data from the marketer’s websites and
offline sources. The Efficient Frontier algorithms will especially
benefit from the clickstream data and conversion metrics captured by the
Adobe Digital Marketing Suite. Adobe customers will be able to develop
predictive models and simulations that are highly accurate and
actionable.
The completion of the transaction, which is subject to customary government approvals and the satisfaction of other customary conditions, is expected to close in the first quarter of Adobe’s 2012 fiscal year. The potential financial impact to Adobe of this transaction is not reflected in financial targets previously provided by Adobe. Until the transaction closes, each company will continue to operate independently and additional information regarding the potential financial impact to Adobe will be provided following the completion of the transaction.
Forward-Looking Statements Disclosure
This press release
includes forward-looking statements, within the meaning of the Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, that are subject to risks,
uncertainties and other factors, including the risk that the acquisition
of Efficient Frontier will not be consummated, as the transaction is
subject to certain closing conditions, risks and uncertainties related
to Adobe’s ability to successfully expand its business in multi-channel
digital marketing and Adobe’s ability to integrate Efficient Frontier’s
technology into other products and services offered by Adobe. All
statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that
could be deemed forward-looking statements, including statements
regarding: the financial impact of the transaction to Adobe; the
anticipated timing of filings and approvals relating to the transaction;
the expected timing of the completion of the transaction; the ability to
complete the transaction considering the various closing conditions; the
ability of Adobe to expand its business in multi-channel digital
marketing; the growth of this market and other anticipated benefits of
the transaction to Adobe; the ability of Efficient Frontier technology
to optimize cross-channel advertising campaigns; the ability of
algorithms contained in Efficient Frontier’s products to leverage data
captured by Adobe’s Digital Marketing Suite and other products; any
statements of expectation or belief; and any statements of assumptions
underlying any of the foregoing. These risks, uncertainties and other
factors, and the general risks associated with Adobe’s business, could
cause actual results to differ materially from those referred to in the
forward-looking statements. The reader is cautioned not to rely on these
forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements are based on
information currently available to Adobe and are qualified in their
entirety by this cautionary statement. For a discussion of these and
other risks and uncertainties, individuals should refer to Adobe's SEC
filings. Adobe does not assume any obligation to update any such
forward-looking statements or other statements included in this press
release.
About the Adobe Digital Marketing Suite
The Adobe Digital
Marketing Suite offers an integrated and open platform for online
business optimization, a strategy for using customer insight to drive
innovation throughout the business and enhance marketing efficiency. The
Suite consists of integrated applications to collect and unleash the
power of customer insight to optimize customer acquisition, conversion
and retention efforts as well as the creation and distribution of
content. For example, using the Suite, marketers can identify the most
effective marketing strategies and ad placements as well as create
relevant, personalized and consistent customer experiences across
digital marketing channels, such as onsite, display, e-mail, social,
video and mobile. The Suite enables marketers to make quick adjustments,
automate certain customer interactions and better maximize marketing
ROI, which, ultimately, can positively impact the bottom line.
About Adobe Systems Incorporated
Adobe is changing the world
through digital experiences. For more information, visit www.adobe.com.
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