Vancouver-based Klue is bolstering its AI capabilities through the acquisition of San Francisco-based go-to-market platform Ignition, just a few months after going “AI-first.”
Founded in 2021, Ignition’s AI-powered platform helps companies manage their full product marketing cycle, including customer research, competitive strategy, and roadmapping. Ignition co-founder and CEO Derek Osgood confirmed to BetaKit in an email that the acquisition includes Ignition’s product intellectual property and that none of its employees will join Klue.
“Over time, you’ll see [Ignition] technology woven into Klue’s Compete and Win-Loss products.”
Osgood did not disclose the purchase price attached to the deal. He said Igniton’s employees continue to work independently on the company’s new product, DoubleO AI. Klue, meanwhile, said the acquisition will accelerate the development of its own AI-powered products, giving its customers more ways to capture buyer feedback and gain competitive insights.
“Ignition has developed agentic AI that makes product marketers more effective and helps sales teams in competitive deals,” Klue CEO and co-founder Jason Smith said in a statement. “Over time, you’ll see that technology woven into Klue’s Compete and Win-Loss products, and we’ll also use parts of it internally to strengthen our own AI operations.”
Smith added that Klue will collaborate with Ignition co-founders Osgood and Karthik Suresh “on internal AI projects as we build the next leg of our AI journey.”
Osgood and Suresh lead the AI-powered workflow automation startup DoubleO AI, which spun out of Ignition earlier this year. Osgood wrote in a LinkedIn post that DoubleO AI is partnering with Klue to “turbocharge their agentic product roadmap” and help with “agentifying” Klue’s entire organization.”
“As part of this deal, we’ll keep operating independently as a consulting partner to help them navigate a massive strategic transformation to an AI-first org,” Osgood wrote in the post.
Klue provides AI-powered business intelligence software that gathers information on competitors. It is acquiring Ignition after laying off 40 percent of its staff in June as part of a company-wide shift to become “AI-first operationally.”
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Smith told BetaKit at the time that the staff reduction would help Klue become profitable by Q4 of this year, noting that the move would give Klue greater capacity to make acquisitions.
Klue isn’t the only Canadian tech company betting on AI’s power to transform the workplace. Shopify co-founder and CEO Tobi Lütke published an internal memo earlier this year telling employees to prove AI cannot do a job before asking for additional resources. Float has also authored its own internal “AI manifesto,” and OpenText cut 1,600 jobs while making internal AI use a “baseline expectation.”
Ignition isn’t Klue’s first acquisition this year. In March, the company acquired fellow Vancouver-based market intelligence startup Goldpan for an undisclosed amount. The acquisition incorporated Goldpan’s AI-powered analysis and data extraction tools, which the smaller firm had been developing in stealth since its founding in 2021.
Osgood said Ignition’s services will wind down on Sept. 30, and its customers will be contacted individually with a discount offer for Klue services.
Feature image courtesy Klue.