Oracle NetSuite to shutter Bronto

Bronto, the ESP acquired by NetSuite in 2015, will cease service at the end of May, 2022. In an email to customers, Bronto announced that it was entering an “end of life” phase, with its marketing automation technology and other resource migrating to the Oracle CX Cloud.

The history. At the time of the acquisition, NetSuite was an independent cloud ERP and ecommerce software company, being acquired by Oracle in 2016. As a major email marketing provider to leading retailers, Bronto was expected at the time to combine well with NetSuite’s SuiteCommerce offering.

In 2013, however, Oracle had acquired Responsys, an enterprise-scale B2C marketing automation solution with flagship personalized email capabilities. It already owned the B2B marketing automation solution Eloqua.

In addition, Bronto’s market share appeared to be both small (0.68%) and declining. Oracle itself commands a much larger slice of the marketing automation space, although it lags well behind HubSpot.

An eye for opportunity. If this was a logical step for Oracle NetSuite, for Bronto’s clients it meant the headache of switching to an alternative ESP provider. Tinuiti, the performance marketing agency, responded swiftly to the news by offering advice on selecting a new ESP: Tinuiti itself, of course, offers professional guidance in selection and migration of email services, as well as email marketing management.

Cross-channel marketing platform Acoustic, home to IBM’s divested marketing solutions, also stepped forward to help Bronto’s customers, with the message: “Acoustic can help…We’re not going anywhere.”

Why we care. Consolidation. What room is there for even long-established niche players in an environment where any business above the smallest mom-and-pop operation is looking to scale its digital marketing? With a market leader like HubSpot offering a bargain basement starter kit, it’s hard to know what value proposition a vendor like Bronto could offer.

This story first appeared on MarTech Today.

About The Author

Kim Davis

Kim Davis is the Editorial Director of MarTech Today. Born in London, but a New Yorker for over two decades, Kim started covering enterprise software ten years ago. His experience encompasses SaaS for the enterprise, digital- ad data-driven urban planning, and applications of SaaS, digital technology, and data in the marketing space. He first wrote about marketing technology as editor of Haymarket’s The Hub, a dedicated marketing tech website, which subsequently became a channel on the established direct marketing brand DMN. Kim joined DMN proper in 2016, as a senior editor, becoming Executive Editor, then Editor-in-Chief a position he held until January 2020. Prior to working in tech journalism, Kim was Associate Editor at a New York Times hyper-local news site, The Local: East Village, and has previously worked as an editor of an academic publication, and as a music journalist. He has written hundreds of New York restaurant reviews for a personal blog, and has been an occasional guest contributor to Eater.