Merkle’s Acquisition of Periscopix

Merkle, a leading technology-enabled, data-driven performance marketing agency and the nation’s largest privately-held agency, announced its acquisition of Periscopix (www.periscopix.co.uk), a leading London-based performance marketing agency. Periscopix specializes in search, programmatic media, and web analytics, delivering measurable results for top-tier global and European brands.

Founded in 2004, Periscopix focuses on the use of data, analytics, and technology to enable internationally recognized pay-per-click search, programmatic media buying, Google analytics consulting, and conversion rate optimization. Periscopix’s client roster includes many top-tier global brands, like Sony, Rentokil, World First, Claire’s, and Multiple Sclerosis Society, as well as a host of prominent European brands. In 2015, Periscopix was recognized as the best large agency in Europe at the European Search Awards and was named to the list of 100 fastest-growing tech companies in the UK in 2014. Periscopix’s Programmatic Team was honored at The Drum’s 2015 Digital Trading Awards as the Best Digital Trading Team and earned Best Use of Performance for its programmatic campaigns.

This is the first in a series of planned international acquisitions for Merkle, establishing a European hub in the UK, which is second only to China as one of the agency’s largest international markets. Periscopix was selected largely due to its similarities to Merkle, both in scope and scale, as well as its deep expertise in performance marketing across European markets. The Periscopix team of 117 digital media experts will join Merkle under the umbrella of Merkle’s Digital Agency Group, under the leadership of EVP Craig Dempster, bringing that group to more than 800 employees worldwide and growing the Merkle worldwide staff to more than 2700.

“We are proud to welcome the Periscopix team into the Merkle family,” said David Williams, Merkle’s Chairman and CEO. “As more of our clients expand into international markets, we have seen greater demand for Merkle to support their marketing initiatives around the globe. This was a key driver in the decision to establish a platform for data-driven, customer-centric marketing in Europe. The build-out of our new London facility is already in the works. It will accommodate up to 300 Merkle employees, including our current and newly added staff, and allow us to scale as we continue to serve our clients around the globe.”

“Over the last 18 months or so, we have been giving careful consideration to the challenges and opportunities we and our clients are likely to encounter in the years to come,” said Periscopix co-founder Simon Norris. “We have been thinking about the issues facing our clients, and how we can best evolve our services to address these both within the UK and internationally. We were incredibly fortunate to quickly come across an opportunity that matched our ambitions perfectly.”

“We are delighted that our vision for the future and Merkle’s pursuit of expansion in Europe came to be so closely aligned at just the same point in time,” Periscopix co-founder, Marc Warren, commented. “We look forward to continuing to deliver great service to our clients, without interruption. We will soon be introducing some great new solutions that will complement our current offerings and help brands build competitive advantage.”