SAN FRANCISCO: AirPR is no more. The data science company has acquired earned media amplification company Ozmotik and rebranded to Onclusive.
With this deal, Onclusive allows clients to not only identify high value earned media, but also to amplify that content.
"In PR, it has become harder to get the story, the reach and the impressions," said AirPR CEO Dan Beltramo, who is now CEO of Onclusive. "Basically, the same amount of effort a PR person [puts in today] yields less results than 5, 10, or 20 years ago because of the fragmentation of the media landscape."
He added that the aim is to "put that back together for the PR person and the company via the Ozmotik capability."
Exact financial details of the deal, which closed at the end of March, weren’t disclosed. However, Beltramo said it was mostly funded by equity, so that Ozmotik’s team is "aligned with their success going forward."
Ozmotik CEO Hung Nguyen is joining Onclusive as VP of media, while CTO Prescott Lee is joining as VP of engineering. Both report to Beltramo. Onclusive’s board, comprised of members from AirPR’s board, is unchanged.
Beltramo said the name change, derived from the words "inclusive" and "conclusive," was necessary because the focus on PR in their original branding was too limiting.
"That stems from our history in PR attribution, where we help tie PR to real business outcomes," Beltramo said. "We also wanted to broaden the scope of our aim, especially as we think about our capabilities and what our customers want to do."
This new name reflects the firm’s embrace of disciplines outside earned media and the company’s desire to help their clients make "conclusive" decisions based on that expanded pool of data, he explained.
Andy Cunningham, founder of the Cunningham Collective and a member of Onclusive’s board, added that PR has become all about media relations.
"[PR] should be the business that helps to educate and influence audiences about a company’s products and services," she said. "That’s what we get paid to do. It’s not just about schmoozing and boozing with journalists."
Beltramo said he met the Ozmotik team through an old connection at Nielsen, where he worked for four years, most recently as EVP of marketing effectiveness. He’s been with AirPR for about a year. Since then, the company has doubled its headcount to 50-60 people.
Over the past year, Cision has laid off staff. AirPR recently hired a couple staffers in customer success and sales from Cision and its recently acquired company Trendkite, Beltramo said.
AirPR’s most recent funding round occurred in late 2018, raising $8 million in a Series C round. A "good chunk" of that funding remains and the company is "still well-funded," Beltramo said. The money AirPR has spent has gone toward customer success and the Ozmotik acquisition.
Beltramo said another funding round at the end of the year could be in the cards, but it depends on how Onclusive deploys its capital.
