Top Customer Data Platform (CDP) and Data Management Platform (DMP) Companies [Updated in 2024]
Data has played a key role in programmatic advertising and digital marketing ever since the Internet came online in the mid-1990s, helping advertisers show their messages to the right audience and learn more about online behaviour. But it wasn't until the late 2000s — when real-time bidding (RTB) emerged — that the role of data took on an entirely new shape.
RTB allowed advertisers to reach individual users across multiple publishers and apps at auction speed. The key ingredient that made this possible was data: specifically, third-party data. Data Management Platforms (DMPs) were introduced to collect that data and enable advertisers to build audience segments for use in RTB auctions.
Since then, the role of third-party data and DMPs has shifted dramatically, driven by rapid privacy changes. Yet data itself has only become more central to programmatic advertising and digital marketing — not less. That evolution has given rise to a new generation of data platforms, most notably Customer Data Platforms (CDPs), alongside other specialized data tools.
This guide defines DMPs and CDPs, explains how they work, and lists the leading platforms across both categories — plus a third "data platform" category for tools that don't fit neatly into either definition.
What Is a Data Management Platform (DMP) and How Does It Work?
A Data Management Platform (DMP) is software that collects, stores, organizes, reports on, and exports data. It is primarily used by advertisers — brands and agencies — to improve the targeting of online media campaigns.
Publishers can also use DMPs to optimize the monetization of their ad inventory and personalize their websites with product and content recommendations. Because these platforms collect large volumes of data, they are well-suited for performing advanced analysis on user behaviour, as well as cross-device and cross-channel attribution.
DMPs have traditionally been associated with third-party data. For that reason, their popularity has been declining as privacy concerns mount — including the GDPR and the privacy changes Google and Apple have made to their browsers and mobile operating systems. That said, DMPs remain a meaningful component of programmatic advertising, and many newer DMPs do not rely on third-party data at all.
The Main Components of a Data Management Platform (DMP)
Below are the main components of a DMP.
The main components of a DMP.
What Is a Customer Data Platform (CDP) and How Does It Work?
A Customer Data Platform (CDP) is a marketing technology tool that collects and organizes data from a range of online and offline sources. CDPs allow companies to gather data from their own properties — websites, mobile apps — as well as from external data systems such as CRMs, web analytics tools, and data warehouses. The result is a unified single customer view (SCV) of each customer and visitor.
With a CDP in place, marketers can view detailed analytics reports, build user profiles, create audiences and segments, and export data to downstream systems to improve advertising and marketing campaigns. Because CDPs provide deeper insight into customer behaviour, they can also benefit teams beyond marketing — including product, customer support, account management, and legal.
The Main Components of a Customer Data Platform (CDP)
Below are the main components of a CDP.
The main components of a CDP.
Criteria for Inclusion
There is genuine industry debate about what constitutes a DMP or a CDP and how the two differ. The following criteria were used to build this list:
Data Management Platform (DMP): Platforms that either operate as DMPs (i.e., collect and store third-party data and other data types) and/or market themselves as a DMP.
Customer Data Platform (CDP): Platforms that either operate as CDPs (i.e., collect data from multiple sources and create a single customer view) and/or market themselves as a CDP.
Data Platform: Any other type of data platform used in programmatic advertising or digital marketing that doesn't fit cleanly within the DMP or CDP definitions — for example, data marketplaces and consumer privacy platforms.
Note: A small number of identity resolution companies are included in this list, but it is not an exhaustive view of that space.
The Top Customer Data Platform (CDP) Companies
Acquia is an open-source digital experience company that provides technology for content, community, and commerce to help brands embrace innovation and manage digital experiences at scale.
Founded: 2007 Headquarters: Boston, MA Private or public: Private
ActionIQ is an enterprise CDP that helps large organizations connect first-party customer data, orchestrate cross-channel campaigns, and measure incremental lift across digital and offline channels.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
The ADEX is one of Europe's leading DMPs and data marketplaces. Its DMP is a self-hosted data technology solution for managing, activating, analyzing, and collecting user data from online and offline channels. The ADEX data marketplace enables companies to sell their data to DSPs, SSPs, ad exchanges, ad servers, and other DMPs.
Founded: 2013 Headquarters: Berlin, Germany Private or public: Private
Adobe Real-Time CDP integrates and activates known and unknown customer data into real-time customer profiles, enabling marketers to deliver personalized experiences across any channel at scale.
Founded: 1982 Headquarters: San Jose, CA Private or public: Public
AgileOne designs and develops global workforce and procurement solutions for Fortune 1000 companies, with a focus on streamlining business processes across human resources, procurement, and supplier management.
Founded: 1999 Headquarters: Torrance, CA Private or public: Private
Aginity offers an active analytic catalog solution built for data analysts, data engineers, data scientists, and business users, enabling teams to interact with enterprise data and analytic code in a unified environment.
Founded: 2005 Headquarters: Los Gatos, CA Private or public: Private
Amperity is a customer data and identity platform that uses machine learning and cloud-scale infrastructure to help brands take control of their customer data.
Founded: 2016 Headquarters: Seattle, WA Private or public: Private
Appier is a technology company that helps businesses implement and leverage artificial intelligence to drive growth, uncover hidden insights, and personalize customer outreach.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: Taipei, Taiwan Private or public: Private
Ascent360 provides a customer data platform for B2C marketers that consolidates siloed data sources into a single, usable data repository.
Founded: 2013 Headquarters: Golden, CO Private or public: Private
BlueConic is a customer data platform focused on liberating marketers' first-party data from disparate systems and making it available wherever it's needed for marketing activation.
Founded: 2010 Headquarters: Boston, MA Private or public: Private
Blueshift's SmartHub CDP uses patented AI technology to unify, inform, and activate customer data across all channels and applications, helping brands deliver relevant and connected experiences at every interaction.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: San Francisco, CA Private or public: Private
BlueVenn is a multi-channel marketing automation platform with an integrated CDP that enables businesses to unify customer data from across the organization into a Single Customer View (SCV).
Founded: 2013 Headquarters: Bristol, UK Private or public: Private
Cloud Manthan Software Solutions
Cloud Manthan provides end-to-end services for building data solutions on cloud platforms, from inception through go-live.
Founded: 2011 Headquarters: Mumbai, Maharashtra Private or public: Private
CustomerLabs is a real-time, no-code CDP powered by AI, designed to give small and medium businesses the ability to collect and activate data in compliance with privacy regulations. It serves eCommerce, SaaS, B2B, and other digital marketing use cases.
Founded: 2013 Headquarters: Delaware, USA Private or public: Private
Exponea is a Customer Data and Experience Platform (CDXP) that ingests and analyzes customer data, enriches it using AI, and activates it to orchestrate personalized experiences across all touchpoints in real time.
Founded: 2015 Headquarters: London, UK Private or public: Private
Klaviyo is a unified customer platform that gives online brands direct ownership of their consumer data and interactions, enabling them to turn individual transactions into long-term customer relationships at scale.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: Boston, MA Private or public: Public
Lattice Engines offers an AI-based suite of marketing and sales solutions designed to drive personalized engagement across the buyer's journey and improve the efficiency of sales and marketing teams through lead prioritization and account-based marketing (ABM).
Founded: 2006 Headquarters: San Mateo, CA Private or public: Private
Lytics is a CDP built for marketing teams, combining behavioural insights, machine learning, and real-time campaign orchestration to help brands improve business performance through better data activation.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: Portland, OR Private or public: Private
Mediarithmics is an end-to-end data marketing platform that enables brands to launch personalized, cross-channel campaigns in real time using programmatic technologies, while maintaining control over data structure and ownership.
Founded: 2013 Headquarters: Paris, France Private or public: Private
mParticle is a CDP for brands focused on customer experience, offering tools to unify data, simplify partner integrations, and deliver enterprise-class security and reliability across growth, retention, and monetization use cases.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
NGDATA helps brands in data-intensive industries — including financial services, telecom, utilities, and hospitality — deliver connected customer experiences through its AI-powered CDP and digital transformation services.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
NP6 is a French omnichannel marketing automation platform designed to increase customer engagement and loyalty. It centralizes all data into a single interface for audience segmentation and multi-channel communication.
Founded: 1999 Headquarters: Bordeaux, France Private or public: Private
Numberly is a marketing technology company that helps advertisers build lasting relationships with their customers through a people-based approach, enabling deeper audience understanding and more effective engagement.
Founded: 2000 Headquarters: Paris, France Private or public: Public
Optimove is a relationship marketing hub that empowers CRM marketers to manage large-scale, customer-led journeys, increase engagement, and measure the incremental impact of marketing interactions.
Founded: 2009 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Piwik PRO is an analytics and customer data platform that tracks web, app, product, and user behaviour in a privacy-compliant manner, adhering to strict privacy regulations and supporting full data ownership.
Founded: 2013 Private or public: Public
The QuickPivot platform combines big data analytics, customer insights, visual segmentation, and customer journey mapping into a unified SaaS offering for agile marketing teams.
Founded: 1997 Headquarters: Burlington, MA Private or public: Private
RedPoint Global's platform helps companies transform customer experiences by providing a single point of control where all customer data is connected and every touchpoint is intelligently orchestrated.
Founded: 2006 Headquarters: Wellesley, MA Private or public: Private
Segment is a CDP that helps companies harness first-party customer data by standardizing data collection, unifying user records, and routing customer data into any downstream system across all teams.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: San Francisco, CA Private or public: Private
SessionM is a customer engagement and loyalty platform that enables brands to build stronger, more profitable customer relationships through data-driven loyalty programs.
Founded: 2011 Headquarters: Boston, MA Private or public: Private
Tealium helps organizations leverage real-time data to create more personalized digital experiences across every team, technology stack, and customer touchpoint.
Founded: 2008 Headquarters: San Diego, CA Private or public: Private
Treasure Data is an enterprise CDP and data management platform that aggregates and translates massive volumes of scattered and siloed data into actionable customer intelligence.
Founded: 2011 Headquarters: Mountain View, CA Private or public: Private
Velocidi is a CDP specializing in fashion e-commerce, offering machine learning solutions to predict customer behaviour and activate audience segments on advertising platforms.
Founded: 2009 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Yespo logo
Yespo is an omnichannel CDP that collects and manages user data from online and offline channels and third-party data sources. The platform supports omnichannel marketing campaigns with flexible, scalable automated journeys, and uses AI to deliver personalized messaging and enhance the customer experience.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: Warsaw, Poland Private or public: Private
Zylotech's CDP connects customer data insights to enable micro-segmentation, pattern discovery, and recommendations to support cross-sell, upsell, and retention marketing.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: Cambridge, MA Private or public: Private
The Top Data Management Platform (DMP) Companies
1plusX is an AI-powered advanced DMP that helps media companies unlock the full potential of their data through AI algorithms that identify patterns in user behaviour and translate them into predictions and customer insights.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: Zürich, Switzerland Private or public: Private
Acxiom is a technology and services company that enables people-based marketing through an open approach to connecting systems and data, aiming to drive seamless customer experiences and stronger ROI.
Founded: 1969 Headquarters: Conway, AR Private or public: Private
Adform is a data management platform that provides clients with enhanced control and transparency across their advertising operations, including full ownership of campaign data to support seamless campaign lifecycle management.
Founded: 2002 Headquarters: Copenhagen, Denmark Private or public: Private
admixer
Admixer is a data management tool that helps advertisers, agencies, and publishers improve performance and monetization capabilities through precise audience targeting.
Founded: 2008 Headquarters: Copenhagen, Denmark Private or public: Private
Adobe Audience Manager is a DMP that supports audience creation, segmentation, targeting, and optimization at every phase of the customer journey across any channel or device.
Founded: 1982 Headquarters: San Jose, CA Private or public: Public
Audigent is an audience intelligence platform that provides brands with actionable data, analytics, and insights to optimize targeting, engagement, and ROI across online, mobile, and social video advertising.
Founded: 2016 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Audience Solutions offers a full-service digital marketing solution with exclusive access to Toronto Star first- and third-party data, enabling advertisers to reach custom audiences across Canadian inventory sources.
Founded: 2000 Headquarters: Toronto, Canada Private or public: Public
Cxense was an AI-powered data management and intelligent personalization platform that helped publishers and marketers deliver personalized experiences to grow subscription revenue and boost targeted advertising.
Founded: 2010 Headquarters: Oslo, Norway Private or public: Public
LiveRamp is a data connectivity platform focused on the safe and effective use of data, powered by identity resolution capabilities and a broad partner network. It enables companies to connect, control, and activate data to improve customer experiences and business outcomes.
Founded: 2011 Headquarters: San Francisco, CA Private or public: Public
Lotame is a data solutions company that helps publishers, marketers, and agencies find new customers, increase engagement, and grow revenue through audience data management.
Founded: 2011 Headquarters: San Francisco, CA Private or public: Public
MediaMath
MediaMath builds an accountable and addressable supply chain for the advertising industry, combining advanced AI with human expertise to reach real users at scale across mobile, CTV, and display channels.
Founded: 2007 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Neustar is an information services and technology company offering solutions in marketing, risk, communications, and security that responsibly connect data on people, devices, and locations across billions of transactions.
Founded: 1996 Headquarters: Sterling, VA Private or public: Private
Next14 helps companies predict consumer behaviour through strategies that combine data and creativity across physical and digital channels to reach customers effectively.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: Milan, Italy Private or public: Private
Nielsen's Data Management Platform is used by major brands, ad tech platforms, publishers, and agencies. The real-time end-to-end platform enables clients to capture, profile, syndicate, and optimize data faster than traditional approaches.
Founded: 1923 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Public
Nugg.ad is a data platform focused on audience targeting and user profiling for digital advertising.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: Marina del Rey, CA Private or public: Private
OnAudience is one of the world's largest data providers, maintaining a database of more than 27 billion anonymous user profiles. The platform uses proprietary DMP technology to store, analyze, and monetize audience data.
Founded: 2016 Headquarters: London, UK Private or public: Private
Oracle Data Management Platform (formerly BlueKai)
Originally BlueKai, the Oracle Data Management Platform is now a core component of the Oracle Data Cloud and Oracle Marketing Cloud, helping marketers use real-time intelligence and customer signals to deliver personalized experiences at scale.
Founded: 2007 Headquarters: Marina del Rey, CA Private or public: Public
Permutive is a publisher data platform built on edge computing that enables publishers to increase data-driven advertising revenue while keeping user privacy at the centre of its architecture.
Founded: 2015 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Retargetly is an independent data solution platform that processes over 25 billion data events per month, transforming them into actionable analytics that drive advertising and marketing results.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: Miami, FL Private or public: Private
Salesforce DMP (formerly Krux)
Salesforce DMP helps companies deliver more personalized marketing, media, and commerce experiences by unifying people's data from all screens and sources into a single individual-level view.
Founded: 2010 Headquarters: San Francisco, CA Private or public: Public
Tail is a digital behaviour data platform that uses statistical models and browser-based integrations to identify and analyze user habits across sites, services, and applications.
Founded: 2012 Headquarters: São Paulo, Brazil Private or public: Private
ZEFR is a video advertising platform that delivers targeted video ad placements, enabling advertisers to run scaled campaigns based on brand preferences with precision and control.
Founded: 2009 Headquarters: Los Angeles, CA Private or public: Private
Other Notable Data Platforms
AirGrid is an audience machine learning platform that allows advertisers and publishers to operate on privacy-first data in the open marketplace, supporting a more efficient and transparent programmatic ecosystem.
Founded: 2019 Headquarters: London, UK Private or public: Private
Bombora is a leading provider of B2B intent data that measures the intensity with which businesses are actively researching topics, helping sellers and marketers better understand audience buying signals.
Founded: 2014 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Datmean is an audience technology company specializing in deterministic data, giving advertisers access to high-quality data for more precise audience targeting and better campaign results.
Founded: 2016 Headquarters: Madrid, Spain Private or public: Private
Eyeota is an audience technology platform that enables the intelligent use of data to support smarter business decisions, deeper customer understanding, and richer marketing strategies.
Founded: 2010 Headquarters: New York, NY Private or public: Private
Eyereturn provides actionable data and insights across search, social, and display campaigns, giving marketers transparent and unified control over campaign performance.
Founded: 2000 Headquarters: Toronto, Canada Private or public: Private
Glimpse Protocol is a privacy-respecting data platform designed to bring technological innovation to the challenge of consent-based data collection and activation.
The data platform landscape continues to evolve rapidly, driven by tightening privacy regulations, the deprecation of third-party cookies, and growing demand for first-party data strategies. DMPs, CDPs, and adjacent data tools each occupy distinct roles in this ecosystem — understanding those differences is the foundation for building any sound data strategy in programmatic advertising or digital marketing.