PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania., April 13, 2020 — AutoGO, the automotive industry’s most-advanced and most-scalable dealer website solution, today announced that it has acquired the technology from WebKite, Inc. WebKite developed a digital advertising and search engine marketing technology, which leverages machine-learning algorithms. Specifically automating the creation and management of digital advertising and search engine marketing for Google & Facebook campaigns to service relative, dynamic product ads to in-market, low-funnel shoppers and buyers. The transaction has been unanimously approved by the boards of directors of both AutoGO and WebKite, Inc. The specific terms of the acquisition have not been publicly disclosed.
With this acquisition, AutoGO further extends its reach in the digital automotive retail space and lays the foundation to expand its offerings to both dealer groups and single-rooftop dealerships. AutoGO is an approved Toyota website provider, and the acquisition will make AutoGO one of the most advanced website and digital advertising providers in the Toyota Digital Dealer Solutions (TDDS) program, as well in the automotive industry. The acquisition will bring more service, technology, and enhancements to AutoGO’s dealer clients.
WebKite, which is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was founded in 2010, with a vision to solve the constraints of advertising through technology. Their technology leverages machine learning for the benefit of the everyday business owner seeking to serve the most relevant digital advertising ads to actual buyers in the market. WebKite’s belief is that much of advertising today does not account for the benefits of where technology and consumer behaviors intersect, so they set out to fix that. Since its inception, the company has prided itself on continuing the optimization and growth of their technology and adapting to the fast-growing digital advertising space.
AutoGO, born in 2017, was founded by Joud Mansour. Joud serves as CEO of the technology disrupter. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, PA, AutoGO quickly became the most advanced and fastest-growing technology companies in the automotive industry. In late 2018, it entered into a partnership with Toyota Motors North America, as part of its TDDS 2.0 Program. With the current landscape of website providers serving dealers, AutoGO has plans to expand its partnerships with other Automotive OEMs and for more acquisitions over the next 18-24 months.
“Eric Silver and Grant Olson have built an insane product that we have been watching for a few years now and we are so excited to bring the technology in-house and fully integrate it with our current platform.” said Joud Mansour, CEO of AutoGO. “We have been monitoring WebKite both as a technology provider and a product over the past few years and have always wanted to make it a part of AutoGO. We are excited to acquire this technology and continue to grow our unmatched product offerings to our clients.”
“Every day that goes by, our team is discussing new ways to improve. Those conversations always begin with Identifying technology that is being used throughout the world today. In this case, WebKite created something that Is able to give us a competitive advantage, using cutting edge tech, in this complex world of digital advertising. We have seen it deliver great success for WebKite’s clients and are excited to bring this In-house to AutoGO to further our evolution and to deliver Increased success for our present and future clients.” mentioned Cameron Hassanzadeh, COO of AutoGO.
“Over the past several years, WebKite has been delivered as a part of several integrated technology platforms. Though several partners were interested in exclusively deploying our platform, we are very happy to see our hard work staying in Pittsburgh as a part of a Nation-wide platform headquartered locally.” Said Eric Silver, Founder & CEO of WebKite.
As part of the acquisition, AutoGO will rebrand the WebKite technology as REACH and plans to run it under the AutoGO umbrella of products. The technology and assets have already been transferred to AutoGO and they are currently scheduling demos for REACH.
About AutoGO
AutoGO is a premier technology disruptor hyper-focused on all things Automotive. Based in Pittsburgh, PA’s downtown, AutoGO delivers state of the art automotive dealer websites with our cutting-edge custom designs, vehicle search tools, and lead-driven user experience. We work hard to build every site from the ground up and deliver a pristine online showroom, ready for our clients and their customers to sell cars. Our culture is driven by collaboration, communication, and camaraderie. We expect the highest quality and best ideas from everyone in the AutoGO family. Reliability, scalability, and quality are just a handful of qualities we’re looking for in our team members. We also expect life-long learners, team players, and innovators. We’re not tied to any one rigid way of doing things, but we also never lose sight of core principles of design and development. In other words: our skills are rock solid but ready to rock the boat at any time. If you’re ready to sit at the table of a high-speed industry with the best team you can imagine, apply to us today. We’re seeking like-minded team members like you.
AutoGO is based in Pittsburgh, PA.
Source: https://www.digitaldealer.com/press-releases/dealer-venom-acquires-webkite-technology/
