Meltwater

In the summer of 2001, Jørn Lyseggen founded Meltwater in Oslo, Norway, starting with two people, a coffee machine and $15,000. Its office was shack number 15 (Shack15) in a shipyard on Tjuvholmen in Oslo, where the team built its first server farm from borrowed hardware. The company began by promoting online news monitoring and analysis in the Norwegian market and was one of the first online media monitoring companies.⁠[1][2][3][1][1]

Lyseggen is a Norwegian serial entrepreneur who began his career as a research scientist in artificial intelligence at the Norwegian Computing Center; Meltwater is the fourth company he founded. He holds a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from Iowa State University and published the book “Outside Insight” in 2017.⁠[1][1][1][1]

In January 2002, Meltwater launched its first news monitoring and analytics product and gained its first paying clients shortly after.⁠[1]

In 2004, Meltwater generated $3 million in revenue and began its international expansion with an office in Sweden; in 2005 revenue doubled to $6 million and the company expanded to the UK and Germany. In 2006 it expanded into the U.S. and several Asia-Pacific markets, and it has been headquartered in San Francisco since that year.⁠[1][1][1][1]

In 2008, Meltwater added social media listening and analytics to its products; that year it generated $61 million in revenue, had offices in 18 countries and operated across the Americas, EMEA and APAC.⁠[1][1]

In 2011, Meltwater’s subscription revenue surpassed $100 million; in 2012, the private equity fund Altor Fund III invested in the company to support its continued expansion.⁠[1][1]

The Associated Press sued Meltwater U.S. Holdings and its news service, alleging that it resold excerpts of AP stories without paying licensing fees. On March 21, 2013, Judge Denise Cote of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York issued a ruling (No. 12 Civ. 1087) rejecting Meltwater’s fair use defense; Meltwater’s service scanned 162,000 news websites from more than 190 countries. The judge found that by using AP content and refusing to pay a licensing fee, Meltwater had gained an unfair commercial advantage, including over competitors that do pay licensing fees.⁠[4][4][4][5][5][5][5]

Meltwater said at the time that the ruling was at odds with a series of earlier decisions that had paved the way for today’s Internet, and said it would appeal.⁠[5]

On July 29, 2013, the AP and Meltwater issued a statement announcing that they would cease all pending litigation and had entered into an agreement to jointly develop new products based on AP content.⁠[6][6][6]

In 2016, Meltwater’s subscription revenue reached $200 million and it acquired the social media analytics company Encore Alerts. In 2017 it completed five acquisitions: the media intelligence company Infomart, the data analytics company Algo, the machine learning platform Cosmify, the social media analytics company Klarity and the data extraction company Wrapidity.⁠[1][1][1]

In 2018, Meltwater’s subscription revenue surpassed $300 million and it acquired the social listening and analytics company Sysomos and the data science platform DataSift; Sysomos was its largest acquisition as of 2021. In 2019 the company completed the integration of the eight acquisitions made since 2016 and launched an end-to-end social media solution within its media intelligence platform.⁠[1][1][1][1][1]

On December 3, 2020, Meltwater was admitted to trading on Euronext Growth Oslo, operated by the Oslo Stock Exchange, under the ticker MWTR. The offering raised gross proceeds of NOK 3,480 million (about EUR 328 million) at NOK 43.50 per share, and the market capitalization on the first day of listing was NOK 12,644 million (about EUR 1,193 million). The private placement was substantially oversubscribed by Norwegian, Nordic and international institutional investors; the proceeds were to fund organic and acquisition-driven growth and, in part, to repay debt, cash-settle certain vested options and buy back certain employee-held shares.⁠[3][3][3][3][7][7]

At the time of listing, Meltwater’s algorithms analyzed 500 million documents a day and served about 28,000 customers. Lyseggen said that day that he founded the company because the world was drowning in data and people needed software to help them stay on top of competitors, customers and their industry in real time.⁠[3][3][3]

In April 2021, Meltwater acquired the Israeli social influencer marketing company Klear (announced on April 14); in May it acquired the French consumer insight company Linkfluence; in June it acquired the U.S. business data company Owler; and in the same year it also acquired DeepReason.ai, an Oxford University spin-off specializing in AI reasoning. Using Linkfluence’s data sources, Meltwater introduced a paid content package for APAC clients including WeChat, Douyin and Sina Weibo.⁠[1][1][1][1][1][1][1][1]

The listed entity was incorporated in the Netherlands on June 23, 2005, with its registered office in Amsterdam; on December 6, 2021, it was renamed Meltwater N.V. On December 20, 2021, Meltwater’s shares were transferred from Euronext Growth Oslo to the main list of the Oslo Stock Exchange (Oslo Børs).⁠[1][1][8][9][10]

According to its 2021 annual report, the company’s revenue for full-year 2021 was $401.6 million (2020: $359.8 million), of which $15.3 million came from Klear, Linkfluence and Owler, acquired that year; its net loss for the year was $77.9 million.⁠[8][8]

On September 15, 2022, Meltwater’s board announced a strategic review, conducted with J.P. Morgan Securities plc and DNB Markets, and engaged in discussions with potential strategic and financial counterparties; the share price on the last trading day before the announcement (September 14) was NOK 7.67.⁠[11][11][11]

On January 18, 2023, Meltwater and the newly incorporated Dutch company MW Investment B.V. jointly announced that the latter intended to acquire all outstanding Meltwater shares at NOK 18 per share, with shareholders able to choose cash, shares in the offeror or a combination of both; on a fully diluted basis this valued the company at a market capitalization of about NOK 5,800 million, a 36% premium to the January 18 closing price of NOK 13.25. The offeror was to be indirectly majority-owned by funds of Altor and funds managed by Marlin Equity Partners.⁠[11][11][11][11][11]

Fountain Venture AS, wholly owned by Lyseggen and holding 29% of the shares, irrevocably pre-accepted the offer and agreed to roll over all its shares into the offeror; together with Altor Fund III’s holding through Big Data Holding Ltd, shareholders representing 41% supported the offer. The minimum acceptance level was 95%, to be lowered to 80% if shareholders approved the post-closing merger, share sale and liquidation restructuring. Executive chair Lyseggen and Altor partner Mattias Holmström did not take part in the board’s deliberations because of conflicts of interest; a special committee of the remaining non-executive directors negotiated on the company’s behalf, and the board unanimously recommended that shareholders accept the offer.⁠[11][1][11][11][11][11][11]

The offer document was dated March 30, 2023, and the offer was formally launched on March 31; on June 19, the offeror announced that the offer had been declared unconditional.⁠[12][12]

The offer was settled on July 18, 2023, with accepting shareholders receiving NOK 18 per share in cash, offeror shares or a 50/50 combination; after settlement the offeror and its affiliates held about 89% of the shares. On July 19, the offeror placed a standing order to buy the remaining shares at NOK 18 per share, with a deadline of August 1.⁠[12][12][12][12][13][13]

August 4, 2023, was the last day of trading in Meltwater shares, and the Oslo Stock Exchange suspended trading from August 7. On August 9, the merger between Meltwater and its subsidiaries became effective, and Meltwater N.V. was dissolved and delisted from the Oslo Stock Exchange; shareholders who had not accepted the offer or the standing order received a liquidation distribution through the post-closing restructuring. Marlin announced the same day that the take-private had been completed and that, together with Altor, it would hold a majority shareholding in the go-forward company.⁠[14][14][14][14][15][15]

In July 2026, Meltwater expanded Meltwater MCP with a new set of tools that let AI assistants take action directly inside the Meltwater platform.⁠[16]

In October 2026, Meltwater launched the brand campaign “Intelligence is Always in Style,” starring actress Kim Cattrall, to mark the company’s 25th anniversary.⁠[16][16]

Meltwater’s product line spans media, social, consumer and sales intelligence, including media monitoring, social media monitoring and analytics, influencer management, a media database, press release distribution and AI visibility tracking. As of October 2026, the company described itself as having 27,000 corporate customers, 2,300 employees and 50 offices worldwide, with headquarters in San Francisco, California, United States.⁠[2][2][2][2][9]

As of October 2026, John Box was chief executive officer; the board included MW Investment B.V., Altor partner Mattias Holmström, Nathan Pingelton and Natasha Mann of Marlin, and founder Jørn Lyseggen, among others.⁠[2][2][11][15][15]

Meltwater: Official website: https://www.meltwater.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[10]

X: Public account: https://x.com/meltwater (opens in a new window)⁠[2]

LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/company/meltwater (opens in a new window)⁠[2]

YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is Google’s video-sharing and creator platform, founded in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim and acquired by Google in 2006. Built around video uploading, viewing, and creator earnings, the platform has developed Shorts, YouTube Music, Premium, YouTube TV, and products for children, and is headquartered in San Bruno, California, United States.Open the full entry: Public channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/MeltwaterGroup (opens in a new window)⁠[2]