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Google acquires social marketing firm Wildfire
MUMBAI: Search engine giant Google has acquired social media marketing firm Wildfire which powers social media marketing for over 16,000 businesses, including 30 of the top 50 global brands. It offers a complete Social Marketing Suite.
While financial details of the deal have not been disclosed Google is estimated to have paid about $250 million. Wildfire counts Summit Partners, TransLink Capital, fbFund, 500 Startups, SoftTech VC, and Felicis Ventures as its investors.
Following the acquisition, the Wildfire team will be absorbed into Google.
In early 2012, Wildfire became the first social media marketing company to have a software platform that integrates directly with Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn.
“We‘re happy to share that the Wildfire team will be joining Google. Their co-founders, Victoria Ransom and Alain Chuard, launched their startup just four years ago. Since then, they and their team have built a service that helps businesses like Virgin, Cirque du Soleil, Gilt Group and Spotify manage their social efforts across numerous social websites. It‘s a platform for brands to manage their pages, apps, tweets, videos, sponsorships, ads, promotions and more, all in one place,” Google said in a statement.
“With Wildfire, we‘re looking forward to creating new opportunities for our clients to engage with people across all social services. We believe that better content and more seamless solutions will help unlock the full potential of the web for people and businesses.”
“Today, we are about to start a new chapter of our story and we couldn‘t be more excited to share the news: Wildfire is joining Google! We truly could not think of a more perfect home for Wildfire. It makes us so happy to know that joining with Google will make it easier for us to realize our vision of changing the way the world markets and enable us to live up to our commitment to make Wildfire an incredible place for our team and our customers,” Wildfire added.
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With 57 per cent single new users, Ashley Madison rebrands as discreet dating platform
Platform says majority of new members now identify as single
INDIA: Ashley Madison is shedding the “married-dating” label that defined it for two decades, repositioning itself as a platform for discreet dating in what it calls the post-social media age.
The rebrand, unveiled in India on 27 February, 2026, marks a structural shift in business model and identity. Once synonymous with married dating, the company now describes itself as the “premier destination for discreet dating” under a new tagline: Where Desire Meets Discretion.
The pivot is data-driven. Internal figures show that 57 per cent of global sign-ups between 1 January and 31 December, 2025 identified as single: a notable departure from the platform’s married core. The company argues that its community has already evolved beyond its original positioning.
“In an age where our lives have been constantly put on public display, privacy has become the new luxury,” said Ashley Madison chief strategy officer Paul Keable. He framed the platform’s offering as “ethical discretion” for singles, separated, divorced and non-monogamous users seeking private connections.
The shift also taps into wider digital fatigue. A global survey conducted by YouGov for Ashley Madison, covering 13,071 adults across Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, India, Italy, Mexico, Spain, Switzerland, the UK and the US, found mounting discomfort with hyper-public online lives.
Among dating app users, 30 per cent cited constant swiping and messaging as a source of fatigue, while 24 per cent pointed to pressure to curate public-facing profiles and early personal disclosure. Some 27 per cent said fears of screenshots or information being shared contributed to exhaustion; an equal share cited unwanted attention.
The retreat from oversharing appears broader. According to the survey, 46 per cent of adults actively try to keep most aspects of their life private online. Only 8 per cent feel comfortable sharing most aspects publicly, while 35 per cent say they are becoming more selective about what they disclose.
Ashley Madison is betting that this cultural recalibration towards controlled visibility can be monetised. By doubling down on privacy infrastructure and reframing itself around discretion rather than infidelity, the company is attempting to convert reputational baggage into a premium proposition.
