In a digital world undergoing continuous structural change driven by AI, it takes careful preparation, M&A craftsmanship and strategic positioning to successfully sell an adtech software business. Privacy regulation keeps tightening, cookies are fading out, and AI is reshaping how the open internet works in real time. Buyers are still active, but they require deeper understanding of the market dynamics and AI-defensibility.
That was the backdrop when we advised the owners of Digiseg, a privacy‑first data platform that enables cookie‑free audience targeting and measurement globally, on its sale to HAWK Infinity.
From day one, our job was to help the shareholders turn strong business momentum into a competitive outcome, position the business with confidence in a changing market, and find a long-term partner that matched what the owners wanted next.
Our role: Turning momentum into options
We’d known Digiseg’s founders for years, long before the business reached its current global scale during 2024 and 2025. They were early pioneers in the adtech industry, recognising the need for alternatives to tracking and cookies, and building a “privacy-by-design” dataset country by country, well before the market caught up.
We ran a structured sales process designed to do three things:
- Show buyers what’s genuinely unique about Digiseg’s data platform and why it’s not possible to replicate at scale in combination with deep DSP / SSP integrations
- Build conviction in the investment case, even with AI-driven uncertainty in the wider ad market
- Create competitive tension, giving the owners choice on price, structure, and future stewardship
With this approach, we engaged with a broad buyer universe and generated multiple bids, giving the shareholders real leverage and optionality when it mattered.
We kept the story commercially grounded and buyer‑friendly, making sure Digiseg felt understandable, scalable and hard to displace and ensuring buyers understood the ‘why’ behind the data.
The market context: Why “post-cookie” is now a buying theme
Digital advertising has been moving steadily towards programmatic channels, while privacy regulation and platform-led changes have made traditional cookie-based tracking less effective. At the same time, AI has introduced a new layer of uncertainty. Businesses across adtech are being forced to rethink how they create value, and investors are asking tougher questions about who wins and who loses as the market evolves.
That meant our positioning had to be sharp and grounded in what buyers could genuinely underwrite with confidence. We focused on the fundamentals. Digiseg’s platform is privacy-by-design, enabling cookie- and tracking-free targeting and measurement across devices and formats. The value sits in a proprietary dataset and methodology, not in a feature that can be replicated quickly. And crucially, the platform benefits from scale. The more it’s used, the stronger and more refined the data becomes, creating a compounding advantage over time.
Positioning Digiseg’s defensible edge
We kept the story commercially grounded and buyer-friendly. Digiseg had to feel understandable, scalable, and hard to displace.
Key proof points helped:
- Digiseg recognises more than 70% of global digital impressions, across devices and media types
- The platform is used in more than 50 countries and supports thousands of agencies and campaigns
- Financial momentum was clear, with double-digit revenue growth driven by integration with an increasing number of DSPs and SSPs
We also wanted to make sure buyers understood the “why” behind the data. The business combines synthetic IP clustering with household characteristics and statistical modelling to enable targeting in the “unaddressable” environment without using personal data.
We designed a process that gave buyers time to build conviction while maintaining the competitive tension needed for a strong outcome.
Creating a process that buyers could commit to
The business itself wasn’t overly complex, but the challenge was getting investors comfortable with the wider ad market’s moving parts.
We designed a process that balanced pace with confidence-building. We shaped materials, supported management through buyer engagement, and stayed close to the detail so we could answer questions quickly and consistently.
We also ensured that the process stayed flexible. In a market like this, rigid timelines can backfire. Buyers want enough time to build conviction, and sellers want enough momentum to keep competitive tension.
In Digiseg’s case, the answers were compelling. The business is built on proprietary data, deep integrations and a methodology that isn’t easily substituted. AI adoption may even be a growth driver going forward. Its scale reinforces the strength of that dataset, creating network effects that improve performance as usage increases. And its privacy-first architecture aligns with the direction of travel in regulation and consumer expectations. That combination gave buyers confidence that the platform’s value isn’t dependent on a single market condition, but rooted in fundamentals that can endure through change.
The outcome: a long-term partner for scalable growth
The sale to HAWK Infinity has given Digiseg a long-term partner to support its next phase of growth, including further platform integrations and deeper uptake across existing customers and new markets.
And for us, it’s another example of what great outcomes look like in today’s environment: strong preparation, confident positioning, and a process that creates real choice for shareholders.
Why HAWK Infinity was the right partner
Digiseg’s shareholders weren’t looking for a short-term owner or a buyer that would change the company’s direction overnight. They wanted a partner who took a long-term view, valued cash generation, margins, and growth, and supported the business to keep building, with the existing team continuing to lead.
That’s why HAWK Infinity stood out.
HAWK Infinity is a Scandinavian investment firm with a long-term approach and deep experience across software and IT. The fit worked on both sides. Digiseg gained an owner that understands the realities of scaling software businesses through market cycles, while backing management to keep driving the strategy forward.
For the shareholders, it also delivered the outcome they wanted personally. The transaction supported a management succession plan and created space for the founders’ next chapter.
What this deal tells us about the market
Even in a digital advertising market that’s evolving quickly and facing structural change, investor appetite remains strong for high-performing software businesses with genuine, defensible moats. Capital hasn’t disappeared, but it has become more selective.
What we’re seeing more consistently is that buyers want clear, well-evidenced answers to two fundamental questions. First, what makes this business difficult to replicate? And second, what continues to hold true if the market shifts again?
In sectors like adtech, where regulation, platform policies and AI are all reshaping the landscape, those questions matter more than ever. Buyers are looking beyond short-term growth and asking whether the competitive advantage is structural. They want to understand whether the core asset, whether that’s data, technology, relationships or network effects, becomes stronger over time or gradually commoditised.
In Digiseg’s case, the answers were compelling. The business is built on proprietary data, deep integrations and a methodology that isn’t easily substituted. AI adoption may even be a growth driver going forward. Its scale reinforces the strength of that dataset, creating network effects that improve performance as usage increases. And its privacy-first architecture aligns with the direction of travel in regulation and consumer expectations. That combination gave buyers confidence that the platform’s value isn’t dependent on a single market condition, but rooted in fundamentals that can endure through change.
The outcome: a long-term partner for scalable growth
The sale to HAWK Infinity has given Digiseg a long-term partner to support its next phase of growth, including further platform integrations and deeper uptake across existing customers and new markets.
And for us, it’s another example of what great outcomes look like in today’s environment: strong preparation, confident positioning, and a process that creates real choice for shareholders.
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