On April 10, 2025, Powerling and OXO (ranked #73 and #93, respectively, on CSA’s Listing of the Largest LSPs in the World for 2024) announced their strategic merger. Long in the works through a “soft merger”, this results in a combined company with an annual revenue of approximately $35 million. While mergers and acquisitions are nothing new in the language services space, this one is noteworthy in both how it came to be, as well as what it hopes to accomplish. So, let’s take a quick look at both companies and their joint vision, and consider the implications for how M&A can be a tool for LSPs not just to grow in share of traditional services, but also to elevate themselves into the role of Global Content Service Providers (GCSPs), companies that move into the post-localization era to offer a broader range of content services to support global business.

First, OXO Innovation has positioned itself as a quality-focused LSP that’s grown into a top-tier provider in Canada. Under CEO Charles Lesperance, it has acquired or merged with four different firms since 2018. This has resulted in an in-house team of 55 dedicated linguists, making it the third-largest LSP in the Canadian market, in addition to having a sizeable footprint in Latin America. 

Powerling’s CEO and co-founder, Pierrick Mathieu, has overseen two acquisitions in the last two years, and has expanded in Europe, North America, and Asia. Notably, the acquisition of the assets of WCS Group – which included Dutch language technology developer Crosslang – in January 2024 added a significant natural language processing (NLP) capability. The company has since focused on technology and solutions that enable digital transformation. Its focus on partnering technology with digital services includes a robust team of 20 engineers who develop solutions that support the bridge from traditional LSP to GCSP. 

The deal is backed by French private equity firm GEI (Génération Entrepreneurs Investisseurs) and Pierrick will be the acting CEO, while Charles will become the VP of Americas and the Chief M&A Officer. Combined, they will now have 110 employees on the North American team and 205 worldwide. 

The two parties’ complementary regional reach and client lists will avoid the common problem of client loss in mergers due to supplier diversity requirements. In addition, they have distinct expertise and focus – on high-touch services (OXO) and technologies (Powerling) – that will combine to expand their ability to meet diverse client requirements. However, there are some additional unique factors we felt were important to discuss here: 

• An extended “soft merger.” CSA Research has advised both companies for years. Pierrick and Charles were able to build and develop a strong relationship throughout their time on our CEO Leadership Council. On the basis of this relationship of trust, they embarked on a long-term collaboration that began with shared business projects and a vision of transforming into a GCSP. The discussions of a complementary relationship started three years ago and has been in collective development over the last six months. This history of collaboration facilitated in the CEO Council means that much of the hard work of melding the companies was already complete before the merger was announced.
• Speed of integration and realized value. Both companies have had their fair share of experience with M&A and so are aware of the risk of a long merger, which is why they focused on laying the groundwork for a rapid post-merger integration. Because of their ongoing collaboration, we estimate that 80% of their systems have been aligned prior to the deal being announced. Crucially, this includes the adoption of joint tools. They also organized their management teams to ensure they are retained and not redundant.
• An expansion of reach, technology, and services. Powerling comes with a strong European presence, in-house R&D, technologies, and solutions. OXO brings its team from Canada and Latin America, as well as an in-house team of translators, which – supplemented with MT and other AI – has allowed them to become a fast-growing high-quality leader in their space. Collectively they fill gaps that will allow them to expand their traditional service offerings, as well as non-traditional solutions. 
• Collectively moving to position themselves into a full-fledged GCSP. This merger demonstrates a change in mindset that shifts the LSP from a transactional project-by-project provider to a GCSP and partner that delivers enterprise-grade international content solutions. The merger is a holistic, tech, talent, and content-centric play. It positions Powerling for the future of global customer engagement. By leveraging the strengths of both companies, the combined one is moving much more quickly toward the GCSP future than either could have done on their own. Powerling hopes to be a case where one plus one is more than two, in contrast to many mergers that result in less than the sum of their parts.

Why does this merger matter? The LSP space has been, and continues to be, hyper-competitive. Over the last decade LSPs have continued to consolidate, with peaks in M&A activity happening in 2018 and 2021. However, it was usually carried out to fill in geographic, vertical, and technology gaps for traditional services or to acquire large customers rather than to change the type of company that the parties represent. Since then, technology disruption has increasingly pushed LSPs to find new services and solutions that move away from transactions into enablement. 

While the largest LSPs have the resources to invest in new technology, talent, and the solutions needed to move into the GCSP space, mid- and small-sized LSPs may be challenged to keep up. This merger points to another M&A approach – one that brings mid- and small-sized LSPs together – to create the solutions and services needed to survive, compete, and grow. We expect to see more LSPs connect and adapt, as Powerling and OXO are doing now, to ensure that they thrive as they transform into full-fledged GCSPs.