Hoping to create a one-stop-shop for conversational commerce

Conversational tech specialist CM.com has agreed to pay $17 million for Rotterdam-based chatbot startup CX Company.

CX develops software that enables businesses to automatically and personally engage customers via virtual assistants, intelligent chatbots and conversational artificial intelligence.

It serves customers primarily in financial services, telecoms and utilities across the Netherlands, Germany, France and the United Kingdom. The company earned $7 million in revenue in 2019.

In-app commerce

The CM.com platform is used for voice, text and SMS messaging; it enables customers to engage with with payments and software features using queries posed in natural language.

Following the acquisition, AI-based chatbot capabilities developed by CX will be added to the CM.com platform. The acquisition will allow the company to expand into new regions such as the Middle East, Africa and the US.

“We believe that mobile phones will become the number one device to enable communication between businesses and consumers,” said Jeroen van Glabbeek, CEO of CM.com. “Over the years, we have been investing in our platform and cooperating with Apple, Google, Facebook, Tencent and many others, to enrich mobile messages with pictures, videos, buttons and various other features.”

The acquisition involves $13 million in cash and the remainder in stock, and is expected to close by the end of June. The two co-founders of CX will join CM.com.