Executive appointments accelerate the company’s realization of the ‘new breed of PIM’

inriver, a software company that powers the entire product journey with revenue-driving product information management (PIM) across every customer touchpoint, today announced additions to its executive team. The appointments of industry veterans Stephen Kaufman to Chief Product Officer (CPO) and Thorsten Larsen-Seul to Chief Financial Officer (CFO) underscore inriver's heightened business momentum and a year marked by global growth.

The company has launched numerous product innovations and enhancements throughout 2023 – most notably by its unveiling of a ‘New Breed of PIM’. Kaufman and Larsen-Seul join an invigorated inriver C-Suite, which has already seen significant expansion in 2023 with the additions of Brooke Cunningham, Brad Habansky and Ulrica Falkenberg, joining as Chief Marketing Officer, Chief Sales Officer and Chief People and Culture Officer, respectively.

“We're thrilled to welcome Thorsten and Stephen to the inriver team," said Niels Stenfeldt, CEO and Board Member, inriver. "The strategic addition of these seasoned senior executives fortifies our expanded executive leadership, elevating our competitive position in the market, allows us to innovate more offerings, and accelerate growth. These pivotal hires reinforce our commitment to staying ahead of industry trends, cultivating top-tier talent, and refining our offerings to drive sustained growth and innovation for our customers.”

Stephen Kaufman, CPO

Kaufman has over 25 years in executive technology leadership in both CPO and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) roles, most recently serving as CPO at Esko, where he led a global SaaS product team providing best-in-class tools for workflow, content management, digital asset management, and collaboration. In this role for inriver, Kaufman is responsible for driving product innovation, delivery, customer value, and strategic product road mapping. He will report to Niels Stenfeldt and is based in Chicago.

“Inriver is an exceptionally well-positioned company, with a culture of customer centricity, thriving in a vibrant and growing product information ecosystem. The sheer breadth of our offering is incredible and continues to solve challenges and drive digital transformations for brands and manufacturers of all sizes,” said Kaufman. “I see inriver as one of the very few SaaS providers in the PIM space that can effectively fill the gaps between a desired customer experience and the product marketer’s aspiration toward that experience. I’m excited to continue growing the product and driving its evolution.”

Thorsten Larsen-Seul, CFO

Larsen-Seul has extensive experience managing and leading financial initiatives within the tech industry, and for the past 20 years has held various positions across the C-Suite. Before joining inriver, he served as both Chief Operating Officer (COO) and CFO at iMotions. With inriver, he will be responsible for all financial activities, including forecasting, business planning and analysis, driving financial efficiency and profitable revenue growth. Also reporting to Niels Stenfeldt, Larsen-Seul is based in Holbaek, Denmark.

“The product information management industry has seen tremendous growth in recent years and inriver’s digital solutions are driving the market toward an exciting future,” said Larsen-Seul. “I’m deeply grateful to be joining a PIM innovator that’s continued to further grow its position as a market leader, and am inspired by what the team has accomplished to date.”

Founder & CEO Mitsunaga Kikuchi to present keynote at eTail East on how the integration allows advertisers to make better decisions based on LTV of customers for the most value

Shirofune, the leading digital advertising automation management platform backed by a human intelligence-first approach, today announced its integration with Shopify, a provider of essential internet infrastructure for commerce, to predict the Lifetime Value (LTV) of online customers and provide advertisers with even greater optimization of their ad campaigns.

With this announcement, Shirofune will be attending eTail East 2023 from August 21-24 at The Sheraton in Boston. Shirofune Founder and CEO Mitsunaga Kikuchi will be hosting keynote presentations on "Unlocking Advertising Success: Leveraging Shopify's LTV Data for Effective Campaigns" on August 22nd and 23rd.

"We are excited to augment our capabilities through this new integration with Shopify," said Shirofune Founder and CEO Mitsunaga Kikuchi. "In this increasingly competitive environment, advertisers who can make better decisions based on the LTV of customers can secure the most value for their clients by allocating ad budgets where they will have the most profitable long-term results."

With advertisers, more robust long-term profits are preferable to smaller immediate gains, but until now it's been too complex and difficult to link all the data to view the big picture. Shopify can identify whether customers are new or existing, defining their LTV by previous purchases, and can also track if customers come in organically and when they make return purchases. Shirofune analyzes and comprehends both ad performance data and CRM data from Shopify, allowing it to calculate the lifetime return on advertising spend (ROAS) across channels, ads and campaigns.

Shirofune gives advertisers a powerful new tool that automatically allocates and fine-tunes ad budgets in light of LTV, while making predictions based on historical data, helping advertisers see the long-term picture and invest in better performing ads as determined by lifetime ROAS instead of the traditional one-time ROAS. As an omnichannel ad management tool, Shirofune maximizes performance across all platforms such as Google, Microsoft, TikTok, Meta and X (formerly known as Twitter). Its new integration with Shopify, and its unique algorithms, automatically connect all the data to provide better insights while saving time and money.

Shirofune was recently named the Best PPC Optimization Platform by the 2023 MarTech Breakthrough Awards. The company launched in North America this February after becoming the #1 digital automated advertising management tool in Japan, where it has captured a 91% market share and is used by leading advertisers and agencies including Rakuten and Dentsu, saving them more than 50% of work hours.

Partner badge highlights companies vetted by Meta for technical and service excellence

Pecan AI, the leader in AI-based predictive analytics for analysts and business teams, today announced that it has been named a Meta Business Partner within the Measurement specialty. This achievement reflects Pecan’s deep experience in marketing mix modeling (MMM) and marketing campaign measurement using machine learning.

This recognition is offered only to companies selected by Meta as trusted experts who provide top-tier technical knowledge and high-quality service to their customers. Only a select few startups achieve this level of recognition from Meta, making this achievement all the more notable at this stage in Pecan’s growth.

Measuring marketing success on Meta and beyond

Pecan’s marketing mix modeling and predictive analytics capabilities offer marketers a complete toolkit for measuring and improving marketing performance. These capabilities help brands unlock the full potential of their Meta advertising campaigns.

Meta Business Partners are skilled Meta collaborators who can guide their customers toward efficient growth. They also can leverage exclusive Meta resources that help them support advertisers in achieving optimal campaign outcomes. Obtaining a Meta Business Partner badge requires a comprehensive evaluation against stringent criteria.

The Meta Business Partner specialty for Measurement especially recognizes that Pecan:

• Offers expertise, experience, and a resilient solution that uses optimal measurement methods
• Complies with Meta’s policies, global regulations, and industry best practices
• Has a reliable and scaled business operation in Measurement to serve the advertising community

“Today’s marketers are under more pressure to achieve difficult targets with fewer resources,” Zohar Bronfman, CEO and co-founder of Pecan, says. “Meta is a critical marketing channel for many companies, and we are thrilled to be recognized as a valuable partner to them and their advertising customers. We look forward to helping many more marketers make the best-informed decisions possible about their budgets and campaigns with AI-generated predictions.”

Pecan covers the full range of marketing professionals’ measurement and optimization needs: understanding channel performance and optimizing budget allocation with machine learning-based marketing mix modeling, selecting campaigns based on customers’ predicted lifetime value, and refining individual campaigns with predictive analytics.

Marketers interested in acquiring these capabilities can find Pecan in the Meta Partner Directory.

Today, AutoRABIT announces that it has hired Christopher Stern as Vice President of Product Marketing. Stern brings over twenty years of SaaS marketing experience to the role and will lead the product marketing function for the DevSecOps leader.

Christopher Stern comes to AutoRABIT from Flosum, bringing a deep understanding of the DevSecOps market, specifically as it relates to enterprise teams utilizing Salesforce for application development. Prior to his time at Flosum, Stern led various marketing functions at the hyper-growth SaaS provider Akami and most recently led global marketing at LimeLight Networks.

"We're delighted to welcome Christopher to the team," said AutoRABIT CEO Meredith Bell. "AutoRABIT has experienced incredible growth over the past three years, and his addition to the marketing team will enable AutoRABIT to continue delivering comprehensive, secure Salesforce release management solutions to its customers."

About his decision to join AutoRABIT, Stern says, "I was particularly drawn to AutoRABIT due to its exceptional management team, strong emphasis on security and innovation within the Salesforce ecosystem, and commitment to DevSecOps principles." He continued, "These factors convinced me that AutoRABIT is uniquely positioned to make a significant impact in delivering secure and high-quality solutions that create a meaningful difference for customers."

Onfolio Holdings Inc, a holding company that acquires and manages a diversified portfolio of online businesses, announces the launch of Get Quick, its new AI-driven tool to help website owners better understand and respond to Google Lighthouse page speed and search engine optimization (SEO) data.

Get Quick will allow users to enter their URL at no cost and will explain the current Google Lighthouse results and suggest potential fixes to improve the website’s performance and SEO. It will also offer the opportunity to ask specific questions and receive recommendations, all in plain language. The Company intends to utilize this service through its SEO subsidiaries, SEOButler and Contentellect, to expand the services of both companies. It will also develop Get Quick into a full-suite SEO audit tool with additional functionality and monetization capability over time.

“We continue to advance our AI capabilities to maximize the efficiency of our current portfolio companies. Free online tools, such as Get Quick, are part of our offering, which is useful to both prospect for new leads and, following further development, create additional revenue through more enhanced offerings on a paid tier of the tool,” commented Dominic Wells, Onfolio’s CEO and Founder.

Sounder's True Topic Contextual Targeting Will Support CTV for First Time

Company to demonstrate cross-cloud disaster recovery and migration at VMware Explore 2023 Las Vegas

Datamotive, a company that provides cloud-agnostic workload portability for worldwide organizations, announced today it has joined the VMware Technology Alliance Partner (TAP) program as a Standard level partner. Members of the TAP program collaborate with VMware to deliver innovative solutions for virtualization and cloud computing. The diversity and depth of the TAP ecosystem provides customers with the flexibility to choose a partner with the right expertise to satisfy their unique needs. Datamotive will demonstrate its solutions at VMware Explore 2023 Las Vegas, booth 815, August 21-23, 2023.

The Technology Alliance Partner (TAP) program is the start of the VMware journey for software and hardware vendors. The TAP program enables hardware and software vendors with the tools and resources they need to build and deliver their solutions on VMware infrastructure. Partners can develop, test, integrate, certify/validate and package products with VMware products and services and then publish their solutions on the VMware Marketplace to our shared customers.

“We welcome Datamotive as a valued member of the VMware TAP program,” said Abhay Kumar, vice president, ecosystem strategy and technology partners, VMware. “This membership means customers can take full advantage of a streamlined cloud infrastructure experience. By joining the program, Datamotive is working with VMware to develop technologies that can transform customers’ environments.”

“We are pleased to expand our reach and support the VMware partner community,” said Yogesh Anyapanawar, co-founder and CEO of Datamotive. “We are confident that, based on the customer demand that we are seeing, cloud portability is shifting from an option to a necessity for organizations today.”

Leaders from DoorDash, Hubspot, Snowflake, SeatGeek, Logisense, and more will discuss new ways to approach AI, Automation, and Integration

Workato, the leading AI-powered enterprise automation platform, unveiled the line-up of keynotes and speakers for its third annual customer and partner conference, Automate 2023: The New Automation Mindset. The in-person event, taking place August 30 and 31, will set the stage for global leaders to discuss how their companies are approaching AI, Automation, and Integration and share stories around increasing organizational efficiency and agility, driving business impact across organizations, and more. The in-person event will be held at The Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California.

“Last year, we introduced the idea of The New Automation Mindset, this end-to-end approach to automating at scale across the enterprise. Since then, The New Automation Mindset has evolved into a leadership blueprint for this era of AI-for-all,” said Vijay Tella, co-founder, and CEO of Workato. “At this year’s Automate Annual, we are thrilled to be bringing this new way of thinking about AI, Automation, and Integration to the main stage and learning directly from the people leading this movement. Automate 2023 will be a chance for us to put a focus on automation that helps innovate the future rather than automating the past.”

Attendees will hear about the current and future state of AI and Automation in sessions from Pauline Yang, Partner at Altimeter Capital Management, Hillary Carpio, Head of ABM at Snowflake, Scott Brinker, Vice President, Platform Ecosystem at Hubspot, Massimo Pezzini, former distinguished Garner Analyst, now the Head of Research at Workato, Gabriel Enright, Principal Integration Architect at Vodafone, Ryan Susanna, Vice President of Sales at Logisense, among others. Automate will feature dozens of engaging sessions that will include customer case studies, panel discussions, product demos, and more. The sessions will include:

• “Experts Tell All: Proven Strategies for Taking Workato to Market with Your Customers” with Alicia Kropelnicki, Director of Partnerships at Agiloft, Massimo Canonico, Vice President of Embed Solution at Docebo, Tom Connelly, Principal Product Manager, Data Platforms at Epicor, and Ryan Susanna, VP of Sales at Logisense

• “Transforming Business Operations: Unleashing the Power of Democratized Integration & Automation” with Emery Lee, Senior Business Systems Analyst at Datadog, Chris Marron, Director, Enterprise Technology at Alation, and Tory Schuler, Sr. Customer Success Manager at Workato

• “Drive Pipeline with Automated ABM Orchestration” with Hillary Carpio, Head of ABM at Snowflake

• “From Crisis to Catalyst: How COVID Ignited SeatGeek’s Automation Journey” with Joe Blanchett, Senior Manager of Business Systems at SeatGeek

• “Harnessing Hybrid Integration: How Vodafone Builds a Future-Proof Enterprise” with Gabriel Enright, Principal Integration Architect at Vodafone

Right after the main stage keynote on August 30th, Workato will be hosting a panel on AI titled, “Women Leading the Way in AI Innovation” moderated by Pauline Yang, Partner at Altimeter Capital Management. Attendees will have the opportunity to network with existing and potential partners through builder sessions, product discussions, fireside chats, and more. Workato will also be providing in-person sessions on August 29th where attendees can kick off the conference by getting Automation Pro certified through instructor-led courses. Designed to help individuals gain critical automation skills, attendees have the opportunity to attend Automation Pro I (Beginner) and Automation Pro II (Intermediate), and Marketing Process Automation (Intermediate) sessions.

Day 2 of the conference will feature “The New Automation Mindset” panel where attendees can meet the authors of the groundbreaking book during the exclusive session. Moderated by Quentin Hardy, Head of Editorial at Google Cloud, get the chance to hear from Vijay Tella, Author, and CEO at Workato, Scott Brinker, Co-Author & VP of Platform Ecosystem at HubSpot, and Massimo Pezzini, Co-Author & Head of Research, Future of Enterprise at Workato as they discuss how business leaders can leverage the generative AI boom for their organizations.

“Today, the massive productivity, efficiencies, and innovations AI can bring to businesses are only limited by the scale with which companies adopt it,” said Gautham Viswanathan, co-founder, and Chief Product Officer at Workato. “We’re at a massive turning point with AI, Automation, and Integration, with a future that is full of opportunities. I’m excited to share our product roadmap and the updates we’re making to allow our customers to achieve even more and embrace digital transformation.”