CHICAGO: Cision has acquired Bulletin Intelligence, it said on Tuesday morning, a week after announcing plans to go public via a merger with a blank-check company.
Bulletin Intelligence creates daily briefings for business executives. The company has also written the White House News Summary since 2001 for the Executive Office of the President.
Cision touted the deal in a statement as an opportunity to combine its Cision Communications Cloud platform with Bulletin Intelligence’s analysis capabilities, talent, and connections, adding that the acquisition will allow it to expand its analyst and data-driven service. Cision is also taking ownership of subsidiaries Bulletin Healthcare and Bulletin Media, which deliver customized daily news briefings.
Sean O’Driscoll, Cision’s chief strategy and insights officer, highlighted Bulletin’s dual capacity as both a curator of information and analytics capabilities as factors in Cision’s decision to acquire the company.
"When you look at tactical or directional-based decisions, fully automated platforms are fantastic in that category," he said. "But when you move into highly strategic decisions, the added benefit of human intelligence and experienced industry professionals providing curated guidance on top of it is increasingly important."
Bulletin founder and CEO Paul Roellig is exiting the company, but will serve as an adviser on issues involving Bulletin Healthcare an Bulletin Media.
The deal will also combine the two organizations’ leadership teams and add more than 100 analysts to Cision’s human analytics group of about 150 to 170 staffers, O’Driscoll said.
Bulletin Healthcare serves more than 1 million healthcare professionals, while Bulletin Media has a customer base of 500,000 engineers, educators, and manufacturers, Cision said in a statement.
Talks started in the second half of 2016, O’Driscoll added.
"We will continue business as usual regarding [Bulletin’s] daily news service and look to extend its reach," he added. "Their customers shouldn’t expect any disruption of services; our customers expect a new capability."
Portico Capital Securities advised Bulletin Intelligence on the deal. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Cision said last week that it is planning to merge with Capitol Acquisition Group III in a deal that would give the combined company a $2.4 billion enterprise valuation and capital injection of about $325 million. It is expected to close in the second quarter.
CEO Kevin Akeroyd, the former Oracle executive who joined Cision last summer, said at the time that the deal would help Cision with possible acquisitions.
Cision has bought several marcomms technology companies in the past three years since merging with Vocus in a 2014 deal facilitated by GTCR.
This story was updated on March 28 with comment from O'Driscoll.
