Earlier this week Digital Media Solutions, a major US provider of high-tech digital advertising solutions, announced the acquisition of the ClickDealer’s media and technology assets, including the HomeQuote marketplace.
ClickDealer was founded back in 2012 by three Ukrainian entrepreneurs: Max Polyakov, Tetiana Serediuk, and Dmytro Atamaniuk. Initially an affiliate network covering several niche verticals, the company now touts itself as “a global marketing agency that now provides a wide range of clients with a comprehensive kit of cost-effective advertising services.” The company has now around 150 employees with a large office in Ukraine, as reported by AIN.Capital.
DMS’s solutions aim to provide advertisers with extended reach — allowing them to scale customer acquisition campaigns beyond their initial scope — while minimizing risk on advertising spend. The Florida-based company boasts an impressive portfolio of campaigns in the insurance, mortgage, education, and other verticals.
“DMS and ClickDealer capabilities complement each other in a multitude of ways, conducive to the development of new and efficient end-to-end customer acquisition pipelines [as well as] analytical technologies with unprecedented capabilities,” says a ClickDealer statement.
The two companies have plans to collaborate particularly closely in the field of home improvement services — with ClickDealer bringing to the deal its lead-gen marketplace HomeQuote “and many upcoming products” to DMS. In the field of insurance, in which ClickDealer has been active since more recently, DMS hopes to strengthen, though the acquisition, its vast range of assets and competitive edge.
Born in Zaporizhzhia in 1977, Polyakov is one of the most well-known Ukrainian-born entrepreneurs on the international tech scene. After a debut in the software development industry, he co-founded a variety of companies, including Cupid, which he took to the London Stock Exchange in 2010 and Maxymiser, which was acquired by Oracle in 2015. In 2014, Polyakov launched an international venture fund, Noosphere Ventures Partners, which has invested in a variety of technology companies.
Polyakov made the news in early 2022 when he sold his entire stake in Firefly Aerospace — a company that he had co-founded in 2014 and in which he had invested heavily — under pressure from the US authorities over national security concerns.
