The Big Qualtrics Acquisition, Melanie’s New Role, and Halloween Candy

Welcome back to Intellicast! On today’s episode, Brian is joined by Gabby Blados to cover one of the busiest news weeks the insights industry has had in a while, featuring a billion-dollar merger, a major leadership shake-up, and plenty of questions about what’s next.

The episode kicks off with the biggest headline of the week: Qualtrics’ announcement that it plans to acquire Press Ganey Forsta for over $6 billion. Brian and Gabby dive into what this means for market research world, especially as two of the most widely used survey programming platforms — Qualtrics and Decipher — will soon fall under one roof.

Brian wonders if this level of consolidation could raise antitrust or competition concerns within the industry, while Gabby reflects on what this might mean for current Decipher users, including EMI. They also explore whether this deal might spark a new wave of innovation from smaller, niche platforms looking to position themselves as alternatives to the new “industry Goliath.”

Next, Brian and Gabby turn their attention to the surprising news that dropped the same morning — Melanie Courtright, CEO of the Insights Association, is stepping down after five years to join Sego as Chief Strategy Officer. Both agree that this was a major surprise for many across the industry.

The pair discusses Melanie’s strong legacy with the Insights Association, including how she unified chapters, modernized the association’s structure, and strengthened its position as the leading voice for research professionals. Gabby and Brian share their excitement for her new role at Sego, while also speculating about what comes next for IA’s leadership and the direction the organization will take.

In between these two major headlines, Brian and Gabby also touch on a few other key stories — including the Census Bureau recent layoffs and their potential implications for data accuracy, and new developments in the ongoing conversation around data quality and AI-driven fraud detection.

And because no episode would be complete without a little fun, they close out the episode by ranking their top Halloween candies.

Thanks for tuning in!

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