Episerver to Buy Digital Experience firm Optimizely

In the US, digital experience platform Episerver is to acquire Optimizely, whose offer includes AI-powered personalization and experimentation encompassing A/B, multivariate, and server-side testing. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Optimizely was founded in 2009 by former Google staffers Dan Siroker and Pete Koomen, who had previously worked on Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign. The firm focuses on EXO (digital experience optimization), and promises brands the power to deliver relevant experiences driven by data, and experiment with and personalize their web sites and apps.

Episerver says the combination of the two firms will create a platform through which to optimize every customer touchpoint across the entire user journey, adding its own ability to create digital experiences through content and commerce to Optimizely's ability to experiment and optimize across touchpoints. This, it adds, will enable marketers to build experiences that 'get smarter' over time. The acquisition is expected to close in Q4 of 2020.

Alex Atzberger, CEO of Episerver says the merger will transform digital experience creation and optimization, enabling digital teams to replace guesswork with evidence-based outcomes. Jay Larson, CEO of Optimizely, adds: 'Episerver and Optimizely have a shared vision to optimize every customer touchpoint through the use of experimentation. Together, we will enable our customers to do more testing, in more places, with greater ease than ever before. We believe this combination will make experimentation a mainstream business best practice and an essential part of competing and winning customers in an online world'.

Web sites: www.episerver.com and www.optimizely.com .