One of Boston’s biggest bets in advertising tech has been acquired for a fraction of what investors pumped into it. Visible Measures, a video analytics company, is getting scooped up by Toronto, Canada-based AcuityAds for $10 million in cash. The deal is expected to close around the end of March.
Visible Measures was founded in 2005 and raised at least $70 million in venture financing. Its investors include General Catalyst Partners, Mohr Davidow Ventures, Northgate Capital, and DAG Ventures. The company developed online-video software that advertisers and publishers could use to analyze user behavior—how viewers interact with content, which parts they watch and share, and so on. More recently, Visible Measures has been using its software platform to do content distribution for brands.
The company is led by founder and CEO Brian Shin, a well-known entrepreneur and angel investor in the Boston tech scene.
“It has been an amazing journey in building Visible Measures into the company that exists today, with a blue-chip customer base and extensive partnerships, and I am incredibly proud of the team and our accomplishments,” Shin said in prepared statement. He added that through AcuityAds, “advertisers will gain access to the industry’s most comprehensive suite of technology offerings to address their digital marketing needs more successfully.”
Visible Measures had about 175 employees in late 2013. The company went through layoffs a year later, and it’s unclear how many people remain today, or how many will be joining AcuityAds. We’ll update this story if we get more details on the outcome.
