News notes

In May, Oana Stroie revealed herself to be Angry MR Client, whose candid and anonymous Twitter posts earned an enthusiastic following in the research industry. Currently serving as commercial manager, Europe, at London research firm Face, she posted her thoughts on the decision to end her anonymity in a blog post at http://tinyurl.com/n2hlkxd.

Following an article, “Switch on and you become a goldmine,” published May 12th in London’s Sunday Times, Ipsos MORI issued a statement saying it “absolutely refutes the suggestion that it is offering access to individual personal data for sale.” The article detailed a trial run, held last summer, of a program under which Ipsos Mori, as part of a deal with EE – a mobile phone company formed in 2010 from a merger between Orange and T-Mobile – was allowed to monitor the habits of millions of EE phone customers. The research firm was “delighted with the results,” said the article. In a statement of response, Ipsos MORI said: “In the cutting-edge research that Ipsos MORI is doing with EE, the U.K.’s largest mobile operator, our mobile analytics explore user volume, demographics and mobile Web use from anonymized and aggregated groups of people. In conducting this research we only receive anonymized data without any personally identifiable information. We have taken every care to ensure it is being carried out in compliance with all relevant legal and regulatory requirements, including the Data Protection Act and Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations (both as amended). In particular, we can make the following assurances: Ipsos MORI only receives anonymized data without any personally identifiable information on an individual customer. We do not have access to any names, personal address information, nor postcodes or phone numbers. We can see the volume of people who have visited a Web site domain but we cannot see the detail of individual visits nor what information is entered on that domain. We only ever report on aggregated groups of 50 or more customers. We will never release any data that in any way allows an individual to be identified.”

SSI, Shelton, Conn., has been designated as a preferred provider in the Microsoft Preferred Supplier Program.

Acquisitions/transactions

Market Strategies International, Livonia, Mich., has acquired Cogent Research, Cambridge, Mass.

Yahoo! has acquired social media polling service GoPollGo. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. As part of the deal, Yahoo! has closed down the service and its team has joined Yahoo! Mobile in Sunnyvale, Calif.

Aegis Media announced the expansion of its iProspect global digital performance agency with the acquisition of nvi, a performance marketing strategy firm with offices in Montreal and Toronto. The nvi acquisition will increase Aegis Media’s Canadian digital revenue by 15 percent and by as much as 33 percent in the Quebec market.

Jupiter, Fla.-based 3Q Global and Quick Test/Heakin, as well as Salt Lake City-based Discovery Research Group, formerly part the MVL Group, have been sold to Morgan Investors. The companies will retain their existing management groups.

IMS Health, Danbury, Conn., has acquired Semantelli Corporation, a Bridgewater, N.J., social media analytics company, to extend its marketing and consumer engagement capabilities for health care organizations. Semantelli offers cloud-based tools that automate the collection of health care-specific social media content.

London ad agency WPP PLC said its wholly-owned operating company TNS has agreed to acquire Sinotrust Market Research, a market research and consulting company in China, from Experian PLC for an undisclosed sum.

New York-based Radius Global Market Research has acquired Profile Marketing Research to expand its independent market research networks. Profile will maintain its brand name and office in Lake Worth, Fla. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.

GfK, New York, has acquired Paterson Consulting, an Australia agricultural insights firm, and has established new offices in Sydney and Melbourne for its animal and crop health team. The new, Melbourne-based team includes Will Paterson, previously managing director of Paterson Consulting. Bob Sloane, who previously headed agricultural market research at another agency, will lead GfK’s business from Sydney. Both are now directors of animal and crop health (ACH) for GfK in APAC. In addition, Stephen Wentworth will serve as senior research manager of ACH in the region.
Alliances/strategic partnerships

Crimson Hexagon, a Boston social media analytics software firm, has partnered with MicroTech, a Tysons Corner, Va., services provider and technology integrator, to allow MicroTech to use Crimson Hexagon’s ForSight platform to provide clients with social data and knowledge management.

Vancouver, B.C.-based Vision Critical and Research Now, Plano, Texas, have partnered to provide Research Now clients and prospects with Vision Critical Insight Communities.
Also, Vision Critical has partnered with China-based N Dynamic Market Research and Consultancy, allowing N Dynamic to offer Vision Critical’s insights community technology to its clients and prospects across Hong Kong, Taiwan and Mainland China.
Elsewhere, Vision Critical Germany has partnered with research agency SKOPOS Germany to allow SKOPOS Germany to offer Vision Critical Insight Communities to its client base while SKOPOS Germany’s research experience will be added to Vision Critical’s market offer.

Australia-based Effective Measure, a digital audience profiling and measurement firm, has marked its official entry into the online media market of Pakistan by supporting the Pakistan Advertisers Society Awards in April and by hosting a series of briefings with key clients. Leading Effective Measure’s expansion in Pakistan is Country Manager-Pakistan Imtiaz N. Mohammad.

Volume, a U.K.-based integrated communications and innovation agency, has partnered with U.K. online research and custom panel firm EasyInsites to provide B2B research services to its clients.

Crown Media Family Networks, home of Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movie Channel, has acquired a license to the data from Cincinnati-based Nielsen Catalina Solutions’ CPG Buyer Segments, a syndicated offering that provides purchaser-based segments on over 2,300 categories and brands. Hallmark plans to use the new capability in the 2013/14 upfront television negotiations to improve the fit of its television inventory to advertisers’ purchaser-defined segments.

MetrixLab, the parent company of San Francisco research firm MarketTools, has reached an agreement with Precision Sample, Denver, to acquire a strategic ownership position in the company. The companies will work together in 2013 to integrate Precision Sample’s panels into MarketTools’ panel-agnostic sample ecosystem.
Association/organization news

The Marketing Research Association (MRA) announced the results of its annual board of directors election. Jill Donahue, senior brand insights manager, Nestle Purina PetCare, will serve as MRA’s 2013-2014 chairman. Joining Donahue on the executive committee will be: Debby Schlesinger-Hellman, executive vice president, Schlesinger Associates Inc. (immediate past MRA chairman); Ted Donnelly, managing director, Baltimore Research (MRA vice chairman); Vaughn Mordecai, president, Discovery Research Group (MRA treasurer); Dan Womack, senior manager, insights, Aflac (MRA secretary). The following industry professionals additionally will serve on MRA’s board as directors: Scott Baker, president, Adept Consumer Testing; Janet Baldi, senior vice president, RTi Research; Jim Bryson, CEO, 20/20 Research Inc.; Jerry Haselmayer, CEO and co-owner, SEEK Company; Jeffrey Henning, president, Researchscape International; Elizabeth Merrick, manager, HSN.

Awards/rankings

The American Marketing Association (AMA) and the American Marketing Association Foundation (AMAF) announced Herb Sorensen as the recipient of the 2013 Charles Coolidge Parlin Marketing Research Award. This award recognizes Sorensen’s “substantial contributions and unwavering dedication to the ongoing advancement of marketing research practice.”

New York-based Analytic Partners, a marketing analytics firm, was cited as a Leader in Forrester Research Inc.’s The Forrester Wave: Marketing Mix Modeling, Q2 2013 report.

Mountain View, Calif., media television and video analytics firm Ace Metrix has been awarded a place on the Red Herring 100 North America list, which honors the year’s most promising private technology ventures from the North American business region.

New accounts/projects

New York researchers Focus Forward and Panel Direct have chosen U.K.-based MARSC Limited to deliver its MARSC panel management, sampling software and community system. The Focus Forward contract requires the build of a new portal Web site along with a database build.
New companies/new divisions/relocations/expansions

ActusMR Inc., a Fort Worth, Texas marketing research sales consulting firm, has rebranded as Actus Sales Intelligence and has also launched a division focusing on professional executive sales recruitment.

Delve, a St. Louis, Mo., research firm, has opened a new office in the Minneapolis suburb of Edina. It features oversized focus group rooms, a test kitchen, high-speed wireless Internet throughout and other amenities.

Lumi Mobile, a London-based mobile engagement insight firm, has expanded to Asia with the opening of an office in Hong Kong.

Health care market research firm the Research Partnership has expanded its U.S. operations, establishing offices in Boston, Los Angeles and San Francisco. The firm appointed Christine Naegle (Los Angeles) and Birgit Eschmann (San Francisco) to run the company’s West Coast operations. Claire Richardson will head up the Boston office.
n New York-based research firm maslansky + partners has opened European offices, tapping Keith Yazmir, partner at m+p, to assume the role of managing director Europe, Middle East, Africa. He will be based in London and Paris. The respective office locations are: m+p London, 35-41 Folgate St., London E1 6BX; and m+p Paris, 54 rue de Clichy #600, 75009 Paris.

Research Panel Asia, Tokyo, has opened an office in Singapore at 250 North Bridge Rd., #14-03, Raffles City Tower, Singapore 179101.

Seattle firm Zettics, a provider of big data mobile analytics, has opened new offices in Europe and APAC. In conjunction, Ken Parkinson has joined the company as vice president of sales for EMEA and Paul Ash has been named vice president of sales for APAC.

Research company earnings/financial news

Oslo, Norway enterprise feedback management firm QuestBack announced rapid business growth in 2012. The company reported revenue of $49.65 million in 2012, up from $39.86 million in 2011, an increase of 25 percent. Billings during the period increased by 28 percent. The firm reported an EBITDA of $5.33 million in 2012.

For the first quarter ended March 31, Arbitron Inc., Columbia, Md., reported net income for the quarter of $16.3 million or $0.60 per share (diluted), compared with $17.8 million, or $0.64 per share (diluted), for the first quarter of 2012. Costs and expenses in the first quarter 2013 included $3.2 million of consulting, legal and other expenses related to the pending acquisition of Arbitron by Nielsen Holdings N.V., which impacted net income by $0.12 per share (diluted).
Excluding the expenses directly related to the pending acquisition, earnings per share (diluted) for the first quarter would have been $0.72 per share (diluted), an increase of 12.5 percent over the first quarter 2012.
For the first quarter of 2013, the company reported revenue of $111.8 million, an increase of 5.1 percent compared to revenue of $106.4 million during the first quarter of 2012. Costs and expenses for first-quarter 2013 were $81.4 million, an increase of $6.2 million or 8.3 percent compared to $75.2 million in first-quarter 2012. In addition to the $3.2 million of expenses related to the pending Nielsen transaction, costs in the quarter increased as a result of planned incremental investments in Arbitron Mobile panels, costs associated with address-based sampling, in-person recruiting and cellphone household recruiting.
EBIT for the first quarter 2013 was $28.0 million compared with EBIT of $28.9 million for the first quarter of 2012. Excluding the costs for the pending Nielsen transaction, EBIT in the first quarter 2013 would have been $31.2 million, an increase of $2.4 million or 8.2 percent compared to the first quarter 2012, yielding EBIT margins of 27.9 percent as compared to 27.1 percent in the first quarter of 2012.
The net pre-tax investment in cross platform initiatives and in Arbitron Mobile during the first quarter of 2013 was $4.4 million, compared to $2.9 million in the first quarter last year. EBITDA was $34.7 million in the first quarter of 2013 compared with EBITDA of $36.6 million in the first quarter of 2012. Excluding the costs for the pending Nielsen transaction, EBITDA in the first quarter 2013 would have been $37.9 million, an increase of $1.3 million or 3.6 percent compared to first-quarter 2012, with resultant EBITDA margins of 33.9 percent versus 34.4 percent in the first quarter of 2012.

Harris Interactive, Rochester, N.Y., reported fiscal Q3 revenues of $33.6 million, compared to $34.1 million in 2012. For the nine months ending March 31, revenues were $103.7 million, compared to $111 million in 2012. Operating income improved to $1.1 million in Q3, compared to a $0.4 million loss in the previous third-quarter 2012. Year-to-date operating income was $6 million compared to a $2.3 million loss in 2012. In response, the company raised its adjusted EBITDA guidance for the fiscal year ending June 30 to between $14 million and $15 million with a full fiscal 2013 revenue guidance of between $139 million and $141 million.

In Q1 2013, comScore Inc., Reston, Va., achieved record quarterly revenue of $68.8 million, up 11 percent from a year ago; GAAP income before income taxes of $0.2 million; and GAAP net loss of $(2.0) million, or $(0.06) per basic and diluted share.
Pro forma first-quarter metrics were as follows: revenues of $67.5 million, up 12 percent from a year ago; non-GAAP net income of $8.0 million, up from $7.5 million a year ago; non-GAAP EPS was $0.22 per diluted share, consistent with the prior-year period; record free cash flow of $16.9 million, up 57 percent from a year ago; adjusted EBITDA of $12.6 million, up from $11.3 million a year ago; adjusted EBITDA margin was 19 percent of revenues, similar to a year ago; on a constant currency basis revenues would have been $0.2 million higher. (All amounts, including implied prior year pro forma amounts, reflect adjustments to exclude Non-Health Copy Testing and Configuration Manager products and are based on management’s estimates of the revenues and results of operations of such products. Prior-period amounts have been adjusted to reflect the same assumptions with respect to Non-Health Copy Testing and Configuration Manager products for the purposes of consistent presentation.)

Tableau Software Inc., a provider of digital charting tools, announced the closing of its previously-announced initial public offering of 9,430,000 shares of its Class A common stock at the price to the public of $31.00 per share, which included 1,230,000 shares issued upon the exercise in full of the underwriters’ option to purchase additional shares. A total of 6,230,000 shares were sold by Tableau Software and a total of 3,200,000 shares were sold by certain selling stockholders. Tableau Software did not receive any proceeds from the sale of shares by the selling stockholders. The shares began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on May 17, 2013 under the symbol DATA.

New York-based Nielsen Holdings N.V. announced that the secondary public offering of its common stock was priced at $35.01 per share. An aggregate of 35 million shares were to be sold by certain existing shareholders. No shares were being sold by the company in this offering and it was not to receive any proceeds from the offering. In addition, the selling shareholders granted the underwriters of the offering an option to purchase an additional 5.25 million shares at the public offering price less the underwriting discount.