The market is shifting fast. Money is no longer chasing one-off features that look good on their own. It is backing the integrators who can connect proven technologies into an AI-ready backbone and make the stack smarter overnight.
That shift is already visible in recent deals. Platforms are acquiring friction-killers, folding them into live data spines, and creating systems customers cannot outgrow. This is the new blueprint for M&A and it is the same strategy we built at RAD Intel (more on that in a bit).
- Palo Alto Networks + CyberArk — $25 billion. Identity security snaps straight into the firewall core and a chronic login headache disappears.
- Joby Aviation + Blade heliports — $125 million. A handful of Manhattan rooftops becomes an instant launchpad for electric air-taxis.
Different arenas, same logic. Buy the friction-killer, snap it into a live data spine, and ship a platform that scales. These are the quiet integrators that move markets while headline hunters chase single-feature start-ups.
Our Artificial Intelligence Buyout (AIBO) model runs on the same playbook. We acquire profitable specialists solving urgent problems, absorb their data into our decision layer in weeks not quarters, and every client on the spine levels up automatically. Marketing came first because revenue signals are loudest there, but retail analytics, CX triage, and supply chain pilots are already live.
The land grab is accelerating for a few clear reasons.
- Valuations have settled at 3–5 × ARR, down from 12 × at the 2021 peak
- Zero-rate dry powder is restless; capital wants velocity, not parking spots
- AI frameworks cut integration from months to days; each new dataset feeds a single learning loop that drops CAC and lifts LTV (cutting the cost of acquiring a customer while raising lifetime value)
This is the year of The Convergence Game. Brands and agencies that master AI-powered integration now will set the scoreboard for the next decade across every industry.
Four proof points worth a coffee refill:
- Didn’t know: 82 % of SMBs call AI table-stakes, yet only 25 % use it daily—belief outruns behaviour.
- Liked the creativity: Escape + Inspiring Vacations offer the six-month – #GreatestTravelJob—up to $136K for a 60-second TikTok résumé
- Inspired by: The Linux Foundation just open-sourced the AGNTCY framework—agentic-AI is now infrastructure.
- Excited about: Palo Alto’s CyberArk deal resets the premium for perfect platform fit—identity + network = day-one upsell.
Flashbacks that still teach:
- Have a playbook before you sign—Cisco’s “acquire, absorb, ship” mantra powered dozens of 1990s deals.
- Deepen the data graph—Oracle’s Eloqua-to-BlueKai spree unified the customer record.
- Culture over code—people issues, not tech gaps, sink most mergers.
- Regulators watch scale, not hype—Microsoft’s bundling saga still echoes in antitrust briefs.
- Show “better together” fast—Slack’s CRM embed spiked adoption only once users felt the upgrade.
My take… great companies engineer optionality at the data layer and let AI surface the next growth lane automatically. That’s AIBO in a sentence. If your point solution feels platform pressure—or your brand wants a spine that compounds every signal—let’s talk.
If you’re looking to oxygenate your brand, campaign or portfolio, reach out with NEWSLETTER in your subject line to jeremybarnett@radintel.ai. Let’s talk, and remember…
Stay relentless.
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