Dallas, TX – Thryv Holdings, Inc., the small business marketing and sales software provider, has appointed Sean Wechter as Chief Technology Officer, adding a seasoned technology executive to guide the company’s next growth phase.

Wechter brings more than 20 years of experience in technology, software, and media, including leadership roles at Boomi, PwC, Dell, Comcast, NBC, and Qlik. His expertise spans scaling SaaS platforms, product engineering, AI integration, security, and building cross-functional tech teams.

Driving Thryv’s Next Growth Chapter

Under Wechter’s guidance, Thryv aims to maintain its competitive edge as it continues its SaaS transformation and sets sights on reaching a $1 billion valuation. The CTO role will focus on strengthening infrastructure, modernizing the tech stack, and driving innovation across product engineering and AI initiatives.

“Sean has deep expertise in scaling platforms, building customer-first products, and aligning cross-functional teams,” said Grant Freeman, President of Thryv. “His technical vision and leadership will be critical as we complete the company’s SaaS transformation.”

Wechter added: “I’m honored to join Thryv at such a pivotal time. The team has built a strong foundation, and I’m excited to help evolve the organization into a product- and platform-led company. I look forward to unlocking new possibilities for our clients and driving meaningful, sustainable growth through technology.”

The Bigger Picture

As SMBs increasingly rely on SaaS platforms for marketing, sales, and operational efficiency, leadership in technology becomes a key differentiator. Wechter’s appointment signals Thryv’s commitment to innovation, security, and AI-driven product development at a critical moment in its growth trajectory.

SearchStax, the AI-powered Search Experience Company, has claimed the top spot in G2’s new Site Search Software category, debuting as a leader across multiple reports including the Leader Grid®, Mid-Market Grid®, and Momentum Grid® for Fall 2025. The company also ranks #1 in the Enterprise segment, reflecting broad adoption among large organizations.

What Makes Site Search a Strategic Differentiator

G2 introduced the Site Search Software category in August 2025 to spotlight embedded search tools that deliver fast, relevant, and seamless discovery experiences on public-facing websites and applications. Unlike internal search systems, these tools aim to improve engagement, content retrieval, and conversion by helping users efficiently find what they need—making site search a critical piece of the digital experience stack.

“Earning top recognition in the latest G2 reports reflects the trust our customers place in us and validates our team’s dedication to intuitive, fast, results-driven search experiences,” said Sameer Maggon, CEO of SearchStax. “Our AI-powered features are gaining rapid adoption, and we have even more innovative capabilities coming.”

Customers Highlight Ease, Flexibility, and Support

G2 reviews underscore why organizations value SearchStax:

• “The platform strikes an excellent balance, offering flexibility for both developers and non-developers.”

• “SearchStax has become a trusted tool in our digital ecosystem and a vital part of enhancing online experiences.”

• “The intuitive interface makes it easy for non-technical users, marketers, and agencies to manage.”

These testimonials reflect SearchStax’s ability to combine enterprise-grade security, compliance support, and ease of use, particularly in regulated sectors like healthcare, higher education, financial services, and government.

SearchStax Solutions and AI Innovations

The company’s portfolio includes:

• SearchStax Site Search™: Turnkey website search with analytics, relevance, and enterprise-grade control.

• SearchStax Managed Search Service™: Offloads infrastructure and scaling for Apache Solr, designed for high availability and governance.

• AI-Powered Capabilities:

  • Smart Answers for Site Search™: Generative AI delivering direct answers from trusted content.

  • Smart Ranking for Site Search™: Adaptive AI optimizing relevance based on user behavior.

  • Smart Match Assist for Site Search™: Resolves synonyms, typos, and jargon automatically.

By integrating AI into website search, SearchStax not only improves content discovery but also strengthens conversion, engagement, and customer satisfaction, signaling a growing demand for intelligent search across digital experiences.

Procedureflow, the knowledge management software company known for transforming dense documentation into visual process guides, has a new marketing leader. The company has appointed Sarah Jeanneault as Vice President of Marketing, betting on her two decades of experience scaling startups and enterprises to fuel its next growth phase.

A Growth-Focused Veteran

Jeanneault’s résumé checks nearly every box on the growth-leadership playbook: brand strategy, product development, sales enablement, customer experience, and even two fintech exits. Her career has been defined by building ecosystems that not only drive revenue but also deepen engagement and customer loyalty—a profile that fits neatly with Procedureflow’s mission to bring clarity and trust to knowledge management.

“I believe trusted knowledge is the foundation for providing exceptional customer support,” Jeanneault said. “I’m excited to build on the company’s momentum and expand its impact across industries.”

Why Procedureflow Needs This Now

Procedureflow isn’t just another knowledge base. Its platform translates text-heavy process documents into intuitive visual flows, layering in process automation, version control, crowdsourced updates, and performance insights. The goal: reduce inefficiency, eliminate errors, and ensure teams—from support agents to compliance officers—always have the most reliable, up-to-date information at their fingertips.

With enterprises racing to adopt AI-driven workflows, the company sees itself as an enabler of “trusted knowledge for human-AI collaboration.” By giving both employees and AI models a structured, governed knowledge source, Procedureflow argues it can prevent the accuracy and compliance pitfalls that plague many automation efforts.

Leadership’s Take

“Sarah’s extensive expertise in scaling growth strategies and building impactful brands makes her an excellent addition to our leadership team,” said Daniella Degrace, CEO of Procedureflow. “Her customer-first approach and ability to turn strategy into measurable outcomes align perfectly with our mission.”

The Bigger Picture

Knowledge management is having a moment. With AI models scraping, summarizing, and automating at breakneck speed, the question of “trusted sources” looms larger than ever. Giants like Notion, Confluence, and ServiceNow are jockeying for position, each with their own take on how teams should capture and consume institutional knowledge. Procedureflow’s bet is that clarity and governance—not just raw AI integration—will differentiate its offering.

If Jeanneault can turn that positioning into market momentum, expect Procedureflow to play a louder role in the enterprise conversation around knowledge + AI.

Fraudsters have learned a new trick: they don’t need to steal your password if they can simply mimic your voice. TTEC Digital wants to stop them before they get a word in.

The CX technology giant has teamed up with VoxEQ to integrate voice biometrics and real-time fraud prevention into its SmartApps Cloud platform, widely used in financial services. The move arms contact centers with AI tools that can detect imposters within seconds, without bogging down legitimate customers in interrogation-style verification.

Why This Matters

Phone-based fraud is climbing sharply, with synthetic voices and repeat imposters getting harder to spot. Traditional voiceprint systems, once hailed as the fix, have stumbled—low opt-in rates, high false positives, and exploitable vulnerabilities made them unreliable. VoxEQ’s Verify solution aims to change that by analyzing voice bio-signals from the very first second of a call.

In practical terms: the system doesn’t need a pre-registered voiceprint. It protects every caller, including first-timers and anonymous ones, while still distinguishing between suspicious synthetic voices and legitimate uses like voicemail or virtual assistants.

Faster Calls, Safer Calls

Beyond security, there’s efficiency. By removing friction from identity verification workflows, SmartApps Cloud with VoxEQ reduces average handle time, freeing agents to focus on solving problems instead of playing detective.

Dave Seybold, CEO of TTEC Digital, calls it “a game-changer,” promising scalable, cost-effective fraud detection for organizations that don’t have Fortune 500 budgets. VoxEQ’s CEO Jack Caven adds that the integration “brings real-time voice intelligence to the front lines of customer engagement.”

Privacy at the Core

In an era of heightened data concerns, the partnership takes a privacy-first stance: no personally identifiable information (PII) or voiceprints are stored, reducing regulatory risk while maintaining customer trust.

Industry Context

This partnership comes as contact centers face a rising tide of fraud attempts alongside customer demands for faster, more seamless service. While rivals like NICE and Verint have been pushing AI-driven fraud prevention, TTEC Digital’s SmartApps integration with VoxEQ positions it as a flexible, plug-and-play alternative for companies wary of complex, high-cost deployments.

The Bottom Line

Fraudsters aren’t slowing down, and neither are the defenses. With SmartApps Cloud now analyzing voice bio-signals in real time, TTEC Digital and VoxEQ are betting that AI can keep the customer experience smooth while keeping the bad actors out.

Automakers want cars that do more than drive—they want cars that talk, anticipate, and personalize. Qualcomm and Google Cloud think they’ve found the engine to make that happen: agentic AI.

The two companies are expanding their long-standing partnership to integrate Google Cloud’s Automotive AI Agent, powered by Gemini models, with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Digital Chassis. The goal? To help carmakers deliver in-car AI companions that go well beyond voice commands and offer fully conversational, multimodal, and personalized experiences.

From Infotainment to AI Companions

Since 2016, Qualcomm and Google have been tag-teaming on automotive innovation—first with embedded Android infotainment, then with AI-enabled cockpit systems. This latest step moves the relationship into deeper waters: transforming the car from a collection of apps into a software-defined AI environment.

Google’s Automotive AI Agent allows automakers to spin up conversational copilots capable of navigation, media management, and even vehicle controls. When fused with Snapdragon Digital Chassis, manufacturers gain a reference architecture that trims development time and comes preloaded with templates for common use cases.

Hybrid Edge-to-Cloud Intelligence

One of the standout features of this partnership is its hybrid edge-to-cloud approach. That means AI inference happens both on the vehicle (for fast, offline responses) and in the cloud (for heavier tasks tapping Gemini’s full multimodal power). Automakers can also white-label these experiences, tailoring them into brand-owned, interactive AI companions instead of handing the keys to a generic assistant.

As Shiv Venkataraman, VP of Applied AI at Google Cloud, put it: “We are putting automakers firmly in the driver’s seat.”

Why It Matters

The stakes are high. Consumers increasingly expect their vehicles to mirror the intelligence of their phones and smart homes, and software-defined vehicles are quickly becoming the battleground for differentiation. Tesla has set the pace, but legacy automakers are scrambling to match AI-driven personalization without ceding customer relationships to Big Tech.

By marrying Google’s Gemini AI with Qualcomm’s automotive hardware leadership, the companies are offering an accelerant: faster time-to-market, customizable experiences, and a system that evolves as AI models advance.

The Road Ahead

Nakul Duggal, GM of Automotive at Qualcomm, calls it a “major transformation driven by breakthroughs in generative AI.” Translation: the car is no longer just hardware—it’s a digital platform that updates, learns, and adapts.

For automakers, that could mean the difference between a vehicle that feels outdated two years after purchase and one that grows smarter over its lifecycle. For drivers, it might mean finally ditching the awkward voice commands and instead having a car that gets what you mean, not just what you say.

Missed calls have long been the bane of sales teams. CallRail, best known for its lead engagement platform, thinks it’s found the fix: an AI assistant that never clocks out.

At HubSpot’s INBOUND event, CallRail announced an expanded integration with HubSpot that brings insights from its recently launched Voice Assist directly into the CRM. The update means that leads captured and qualified by Voice Assist now automatically flow into HubSpot, giving sales and marketing teams a unified, 24/7 picture of customer activity.

Voice Assist: A Call Handler That Works Nights

Launched in July, Voice Assist captures and qualifies leads around the clock, handling conversations with a human-like cadence. For companies that can’t afford to lose high-intent prospects after hours, it’s a safety net—and one that pairs neatly with HubSpot’s follow-up workflows.

CallRail says the HubSpot integration makes this AI assistant more valuable, since every conversation summary, qualification insight, and customer data point is synced automatically. The result: fewer gaps, faster follow-up, and stronger attribution for ROI-minded marketers.

On the Ground at INBOUND

At INBOUND, CallRail showed off live demos of Voice Assist, letting attendees hear for themselves how the system qualifies leads and drops conversation data into HubSpot. Customers like Mid-Atlantic Builders are already seeing an impact. “Missed calls are virtually nonexistent now,” said Bradford Smith, VP of sales and marketing at the firm. “And the ability to store full conversation summaries in HubSpot will only give us deeper insights.”

Recognition in the HubSpot Ecosystem

The announcement comes as CallRail secures a spot—for the second year running—on HubSpot’s Essential Apps for Sales list, a curated group of integrations that help sellers move faster and smarter. Angela O’Dowd, VP of partner ecosystem at HubSpot, called Voice Assist “an innovative solution that ensures every lead is captured, qualified, and seamlessly integrated into our CRM.”

Why It Matters

The integration underscores a broader trend: CRMs are no longer passive data stores, but living systems fed by AI-powered tools that catch leads before they slip through the cracks. Rival platforms like Salesforce and Zoho have been embedding conversational AI into their ecosystems; HubSpot is leaning on app partners like CallRail to deliver similar value without overhauling its own core software.

For agencies and small-to-midsize businesses in particular, the promise is compelling: no more missed leads, no more guessing whether the follow-up data is complete, and no more disconnect between marketing attribution and sales execution.

Recruiters spend too much time toggling between systems and not enough time talking to people. Phenom and LinkedIn want to change that.

Phenom, the applied AI talent platform, has rolled out LinkedIn CRM Connect integration for its Talent CRM. The update lets recruiters discover, engage, and manage candidates seamlessly between LinkedIn Recruiter and Phenom Talent CRM, eliminating the need to duplicate data or manually update profiles. For recruiters buried in spreadsheets and browser tabs, this integration feels less like a feature and more like a time machine.

One Source of Truth for Candidate Data

With CRM Connect, talent acquisition teams can:

• Pull profiles directly from LinkedIn Recruiter into the Phenom CRM.

• Automatically sync updates like job titles, emails, and candidate statuses.

• See where each candidate stands in real time—no system-hopping required.

For Henry Lazo, Talent Acquisition Programs Lead at Cboe, the payoff is simple: “Data accuracy is number one for me — and this integration delivers. I no longer have to manually enter candidates; everything syncs automatically.”

Efficiency at Scale

The integration is available at no extra cost for Phenom CRM customers with LinkedIn Recruiter seats. The result is a single, unified workflow that gives recruiters more time to engage candidates rather than babysit databases. Larry Nelson, LinkedIn’s Head of Talent Partnerships, called it “accurate, up-to-date candidate data you can trust.”

Beyond syncing, Phenom’s CRM layers on its AI capabilities: Fit Scores, nurture campaigns, interview intelligence, and automation that reduce manual screening and scheduling. Combined, these tools help teams scale outreach without scaling headcount.

Proof in the Numbers

Phenom’s customers are already seeing hard ROI:

• A major airline self-sourced 80% of contractor roles and cut staffing vendors by 88%, saving $7M annually.

• A global financial firm grew candidate profiles 900% after unifying sourcing and engagement tools.

• A cruise line slashed fake applications and boosted recruiter productivity by 40%, reclaiming 80,000 hours.

In short, fewer clicks = faster hires.

The Bigger Picture

Recruiting tech is shifting fast toward automation and data integration. Rivals like Workday and Greenhouse have been pushing deeper CRM-ATS connectivity, while LinkedIn has become the indispensable sourcing channel. Phenom’s integration strikes at the heart of recruiter frustration: disjointed systems and outdated candidate data.

Joanna Keel, Product Marketing at Phenom, summed it up: “The companies that spend more time connecting with candidates rather than updating information will hire faster.”

ProRataAI, a startup advocating for fair AI models, has raised $40 million in a Series B round led by Touring Capital to accelerate the rollout of Gist Answers. The AI-as-a-service solution lets publishers embed custom AI search, summarization, and recommendation tools directly into their websites—keeping users engaged while ensuring creators get credit.

Launched with early-access partners spanning 100+ publications, Gist Answers is designed to flip the script on AI search. Instead of directing audiences away from publisher sites, the tool brings conversational, AI-driven discovery onto their platforms—extending sessions, boosting engagement, and reclaiming control over how content is surfaced.

“Search has always shaped how people discover knowledge, but for too long publishers have been forced to give that power away,” said Bill Gross, CEO and founder of ProRata. “Gist Answers changes that dynamic, bringing AI search directly to their sites, where it deepens engagement, restores control, and opens entirely new paths for discovery.”

The service builds on ProRata’s wider ecosystem:

• Gist Ads turns AI responses into monetizable real estate, placing contextual ads alongside AI answers.

• Content Licensing allows publishers to extend reach by contributing vetted, licensed material to third-party Gist Answers implementations. More than 700 publications have already signed on, reinforcing ProRata’s ethical, attribution-first model.

Industry leaders are backing the approach. Nicholas Thompson, CEO of The Atlantic, said partnering with ProRata ensures journalism is used “ethically, with full credit.” Andrew Perlman of Recurrent (Popular Science) called Gist Answers a way to keep trusted reporting central in the AI era.

For advertisers, the play is equally compelling. Native placements aligned with intent-rich AI answers represent premium inventory, while publishers unlock incremental revenue streams. Touring Capital’s Nagraj Kashyap described it as “market-neutral infrastructure designed to become the default platform for attribution and fair monetization.”

ProRata, founded just last year, has now raised over $75 million. With Gist Answers gaining traction across global media, the company is positioning itself as a counterweight to AI scraping practices that sideline creators. Its mantra: AI should amplify journalism, not exploit it.