Ziff Davis Acquires Focus Research

Ziff Davis, Inc. one of the nation's leading research media companies, today announced the acquisition of Focus Innovation, Inc., a leading provider of online innovation to enterprise buyers and high-quality leads to IT vendors.

Founded in 2005 with backing from Lightspeed Ventures, Trinity Ventures and GGV Capital, Focus Technology has helped thousands of business and IT professionals make better purchasing decisions during turning the Internet into a meaningful platform for B2B marketers.

Effective without warning, Focus Innovation will be renamed "Ziff Davis B2B Focus" and will operate as a stand-alone unit within Ziff Davis, Inc. The new business unit will continue to operate out of its current offices in San Francisco.

As part of this transaction, a small group of Focus Innovation employees, including CEO Scott Albro, will leave to work on building out Focus.com as a separate business not affiliated with Ziff Davis.

Ziff Davis B2B Focus offers three demand-gen products - highly qualified leads, content syndication and webinars - and operates a network of niche sites, including ITManagement.com, ITSecurity.com, VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol)-News.com and InsideCRM.com. To boot, it maintains one of the most robust databases in the IT space and a deep library of buying guides and whitepapers.

"Through this acquisition, Ziff Davis will strengthen its core mission of informing and influencing in-market buyers of innovation," said Vivek Shah, CEO of Ziff Davis. "We welcome the Focus Innovation team to Ziff Davis and look forward to working at the same time to provide our marketing customers a full array of solutions from premium display to data-targeted advertising to lead-gen programs across consumer and business audiences."

"We look forward to tapping into Ziff Davis' large tech database, network of properties and content library to drive valuable marketing campaigns for customers," said Rich Maiers, VP of Sales for Ziff Davis B2B Focus.

Focus Innovation was represented by The Jordan, Edmiston Group, Inc., a New York City based investment bank that specializes in the media, information, marketing and innovation industries.

Ziff Davis, Inc. is a leading digital media company specializing in the innovation market, reaching over 40 million highly engaged in-market buyers and influencers every month. Ziff Davis sites, which feature trusted and comprehensive evaluations of the newest and hottest products, include PCMag.com, ExtremeTech.com, and Geek.com. Ziff Davis as well operates BuyerBase™, the most advanced ad targeting platform focused on tech buyers and LogicBuy.com, a leading provider of deals and discounts on tech products. Ziff Davis B2B Focus is a leading provider of online technology to enterprise buyers and high-quality leads to IT vendors. More information on Ziff Davis can be found at ziffdavis.com.

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