Hospitality marketing vendor (and CDP) Cendyn has purchased WIHP, a specialist in “metasearch”, which is the hospitality industry term for connecting hotels with price comparison websites. We don’t see too many acquisitions by CDP vendors, but, then again, CDP is just one of many features offered by Cendyn.
Also at Google Cloud Next, AI-based content creation tool Typeface announced it has collaborated with GrowthLoop (originally data extraction tool Flywheel) to create a unified marketing solution that automatically builds audience segments, generates custom content, and distributes the results across multiple channels. It’s a good example of how AI and cloud platforms enable companies outside of the traditional marketing technology space to quickly develop sophisticated products.
Visa is working with local banks and fintech companies in Kenya to launch contactless payments. Customers will be able to transact without a physical wallet or a card. Customers can use the Thales-powered service by tapping their Near-field communication (NFC) enabled smartphones at any contactless payment terminal to make in-store purchases using their banking app.
CX management platform Sprinklr is introducing “digital twins.” Not your average chatbot, a Sprinklr digital twin is more like an AI-powered employee, able to plan actions, create workflows and make decisions, but at speed and at scale. They are said to be more easily trained than chatbots and can operate within brand policies and guardrails.