NEW YORK, August 20, 2025 — Podean, the leading global marketplace agency and recipient of Amazon’s coveted “Global Expansion Award”, announced the strategic acquisition of Commerce Canal, a leader in marketplace strategy and operations. With investment from Mountaingate Capital, the combined company establishes a powerful platform for high-growth global brands, bringing together Podean’s global strategy, analytics, media, social commerce and content solutions with Commerce Canal’s marketplace optimization strategy, brand, licensor and licensee management capabilities.
The combination of Podean and Commerce Canal will create the largest independent global marketplace focused agency and deliver an end-to-end solution, powered by the proprietary Purvey.AI data and insights platform. The integrated offering, spanning all major marketplaces including Amazon, Walmart, Costco, Target, Instacart, and Mercado Libre, will drive accelerated growth and sales, and create unfair advantage for their clients.
Mark Power, who founded Podean in 2019 commented, “It has always been our vision to build the leading independent agency servicing clients on marketplaces around the world. The addition of Commerce Canal further deepens our marketplace strategy and operations and embeds deep data and AI into our processes to deliver insights and optimizations with scale and speed.”
Ryan Craver, Commerce Canal’s founder added, “We’re excited to join forces with Podean, a respected industry leader, to deliver a truly differentiated, machine‑learning‑driven offering powered by our Purvey.AI platform. Together, we’ll help brands expand globally through Podean’s global reach, creative expertise, and social commerce capabilities.”
The company will have more than 200 team members across 17 countries on 5 continents, supporting over 200 brands and licensees globally. Clients of the combined platform include Mattel, Danone, Wella, De’Longhi, Revolution Beauty, Colgate-Palmolive, Luxottica, Spectrum Brands, Shure, OluKai, Steve Madden, AB InBev, Skechers and Fruit of the Loom.
Adam Cagan, SVP, Kids at Centric Brands said, “Centric Brands has deep expertise and understanding in what it takes to build and grow a successful Amazon business. We manage tens of thousands of apparel and accessory SKUs across multiple marketplaces globally. Podean has been a strategic partner of ours across many divisions since 2021 and we appreciate their continued investment in offerings through their new acquisition, in particular a focus on applying AI to deliver the efficiency and effectiveness needed for us to maintain and expand our category leadership.”
Travis Johnson, Podean’s CEO concluded, “This is the beginning of something unique and at scale in the market. Commerce Canal is the perfect complement to Podean’s current global offering. We’re excited to join forces and leverage our combined capabilities as one team of marketplace experts.”
The three agency founders will transition into new roles and be key board members within the larger platform. Mark will focus on growth of relationships, talent and clients. Ryan will focus on the strategy and analytics disciplines within the business. Travis will be the Chief Executive Officer.
The strategic combination of Podean and Commerce Canal was facilitated via an equity investment from Mountaingate Capital, a Colorado-based, growth-focused private equity firm. Mountaingate has deep experience in this space having been the original private equity investors in Tinuiti and Mars United Commerce.