Jive And Aurea CEOs Present United Front At JiveWorld 2017

Yesterday Jive Software made the surprise announcement that it has been acquired by investment firm ESW Capital LLC for $462 million (£357m) to join the Aurea family of companies.

Although not too many details were initially made available, Jive CEO Elisa Steele was joined on stage at JiveWorld 2017’s official opening keynote by Aurea CEO Scott Brighton to shed more light on the deal and the reasons behind it.

Brighton explained that the “drive to create something profound” and the emphasis on customer success were two of the main factors that led to the acquisition, along with the potential to create value for customers.

Shared vision

“Everyone here is working to use Jive Software to essentially unlock the potential of their organisations to create something profound,” he said. “And I think that profound mission drives a level of passion both in customers and in Jivers that is different.

“You’re trying to unlock the potential of your organisations and that is different and we feel that and frankly it’s contagious”

Steele noted that one thing the two organisations have in common is their “commitment to customer success”, which Brighton defined as being the next step up from customer satisfaction and involves taking “authentic accountability for customers”.

He said: “Customer satisfaction is when users like the software, it perfoms OK, there are no bugs, kind of low bar stuff. When we talk about customer success, we’re talking about the investment you’ve made in money, in time, in people, in the relationship and whether you’re getting the return you expect from that relationship.”

Finally, Steele asked Brighton to explain the joint value proposition that the acquisition will enable, which will essentially involve integrating Jive’s customer engagement and employee engagement products into Aurea’s portfolio to create: “a bigger vision of how we can help organisations transform engagement.”

It was a strong united front from the two CEOs, but only time will tell whether the deal will turn out to be a good move for the two companies and, of course, their customers.

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