Customer experience platform Qualitrics is running its annual conference right now, which is the occasion of much merriment and many announcements.  Two relevant to you, Dear Reader, are a new integration with Merkle’s Merkury identity resolution service and another to exchange data with Twilio Segment. So much fun!

Retail advertising company Criteo has purchased Brandcrush, an Australia-based firm that specializes in helping retailers sell ads in their own online and offline locations.  The deal gives Critero a firmer foothold in the booming retail media network industry, as well expanding their presence in the Asia-Pacific region.

“Ask Meta AI anything” is what you now see instead of the traditional search bar across Meta apps such as Facebook and Instagram. Meta AI will still perform the basic search function but will also answer questions and chat with you. It should hardly be a surprise when a tech company launches a genAI solution these days but this is a bold challenge to Google and Open.ai (it’s also available as a standalone tool at Meta.ai).