LiveRamp moves into B2B data with purchase of Pacific Data Partners

LiveRamp’s IdentityLink utilizes millions of anonymized, cross-channel profiles of consumers for the targeting of ads and other marketing through demand-side platforms and data management platforms.

Today, the company is enlarging its scope to include businesses, announcing it has purchased B2B data provider Pacific Data Partners (PDP). Deal terms were not made public.

The co-founders of the Seattle-based PDP, Pieter De Temmerman and Grant Ries, are former execs at Oracle and BlueKai, and they will lead the effort to move LiveRamp into B2B marketing.

“A consumer marketer might be interested in delivering a relevant ad to me,“ LiveRamp CMO and GM for Brands Jeff Smith told me, as well as “reaching the CMO of LiveRamp.” Now, she can do either or both through LiveRamp’s data, which might be accessed separately or through linked consumer and business profiles.

The move also means that LiveRamp’s Advertising ID Consortium, based around the IdentityLink cookie ID, can now also target businesses and business employees directly.

While LiveRamp previously had some “nascent B2B data,” Smith said, this acquisition represents a full step into that marketplace. PDP offers 50 billion B2B records, which include professional records like job titles, firmographic profiles about businesses and technographic records about the technologies businesses use.

Last week, LiveRamp’s parent Acxiom announced it was streamlining its portfolio of three divisions into two business units: LiveRamp for all identity data solutions and Marketing Solutions for providing expert-based services.

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About The Author

Barry Levine

Barry Levine covers marketing technology for Third Door Media. Previously, he covered this space as a Senior Writer for VentureBeat, and he has written about these and other tech subjects for such publications as CMSWire and NewsFactor. He founded and led the web site/unit at PBS station Thirteen/WNET; worked as an online Senior Producer/writer for Viacom; created a successful interactive game, PLAY IT BY EAR: The First CD Game; founded and led an independent film showcase, CENTER SCREEN, based at Harvard and M.I.T.; and served over five years as a consultant to the M.I.T. Media Lab. You can find him at LinkedIn, and on Twitter at xBarryLevine.