The commerce platform Howl, which powers affiliate businesses by connecting content creators to retailers, quietly sold the creator division of its business to Connexity, a commerce platform owned by Taboola, in August.
Representatives for both companies confirmed the sale but declined to share further financial specifics.
The amount that Taboola, a publicly traded company, paid for the business is not large enough to have required disclosure in its quarterly earnings, according to a source familiar with the matter.
“We’re excited that Connexity will continue to invest in and grow Howl as the leading creator commerce platform in tech, gaming, and collectibles,” Howl founder Li Haslett Chen told ADWEEK.
For Howl, the sale comes as the affiliate platform once again faces accusations of late or delayed payment to both its publisher partners and creators, according to three publishers, two of which are owed money.
In 2023, Howl fell behind on payments to its publishing partners, racking up millions of dollars in delinquent invoices and bottlenecking a key source of publisher revenue, ADWEEK reported at the time. The overdue payments stretched back up to eight months and ranged from $20,000 to $900,000.
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In conjunction with the asset sale, Howl told publishers that it was focusing its efforts on paying back the publishers that it owed, according to two of the people.
“[Howl] apparently still owed me a bit of money, which I finally got paid—over a year later,” said one publishing executive. “They mentioned that resolving outstanding balances and fixing the payment system was their top priority with the new acquisition, and it seems like they’re making that whole.”
According to the head of affiliate revenue at a major publisher, Howl still owes them around $60,000.
Howl did not respond to questions concerning its overdue payments to publishers or its plans to repay them.
Connexity has since paid off the balances Howl owed to its creators, according to one of the people.
Connexity alluded to these payment issues in an August email it sent to the creators whose business it acquired through the asset sale, according to a copy of the memo obtained by ADWEEK.
“We know payments have been a pain point, and fixing that is priority number one,” the email said.
Connexity acquired Howl’s creator business to supplement its own creator affiliate operation, called ShopYourLikes. Following the deal, SYL is now reaching out to the brands that Howl was working with on the creator side, trying to win their business, according to the source familiar with the matter.
Howl first launched in 2017, originally called Narrativ, and aimed to power publishers’ affiliate businesses. It generates revenue by taking a percentage fee of the affiliate deals that it facilitates.
But in 2022, the company rebranded to Howl as part of a larger effort to orient its operations more around social commerce and creators.
In selling its creator division to Connexity, Howl is parting ways with the business that it has spent the last several years prioritizing, as previously reported by ADWEEK.
For now, the company is reassessing its strategy but plans to continue operating in the commerce space, according to Chen.
“Howl is continuing to operate as we evaluate what’s next,” Chen said. “We are exploring the opportunity to innovate with big platforms as the future of AI-native commerce is unfolding.”