Rakuten and impact.com Announce Alliance to Scale the Global Partnership Economy

New collaboration combines technology, global scale, and consumer intelligence to drive advertising performance within a unified ecosystem

SAN MATEO, Calif. and NEW YORK, April 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Rakuten International and impact.com today announced a strategic alliance to modernize the affiliate and performance marketing ecosystem.

The collaboration unites Rakuten Advertising's global partner relationships, managed services, and performance intelligence; Rakuten Rewards' Cash Back shopping platform and consumer reach; and impact.com's leading technology platform and global marketplace to create the industry's most comprehensive and scalable performance marketing ecosystem.

Under this initiative, Rakuten Advertising and impact.com will deliver an integrated technology and services model, combining Rakuten Advertising's strategic expertise, program management, and global execution with impact.com's platform infrastructure for contracting, tracking, and payments across commerce partnerships. 

Advertisers working with Rakuten Advertising will benefit from expanded platform capabilities and a broader ecosystem, while impact.com customers will gain access to Rakuten Advertising performance intelligence and managed services. Through Rakuten Rewards' direct consumer signals, advertisers can better understand incrementality, improve attribution, and optimize performance, while driving both customer acquisition and long-term loyalty.

Rakuten Advertising will continue to develop AI, analytics, automation and monitoring capabilities, while Rakuten Rewards and impact.com will collaborate to advance the next generation of performance-based marketing, including advancements in real-time tracking and attribution and the ability to offer enhanced shopper incentives throughout the shopping journey. 

"As a global network, publisher, and strategic operator for more than two decades, Rakuten has developed an unparalleled perspective on what drives performance," said Amit Patel, CEO of Rakuten International. "This alliance brings together infrastructure, service excellence, global reach, and consumer intelligence to offer a fundamentally stronger approach to performance marketing. By pairing with impact.com's industry-leading platform, advertisers will have access to a unified technology and services solution that combines performance intelligence, managed execution, and consumer insight to deliver programmatic, data-driven programs with smarter insights, stronger execution, and measurable results at global scale."

"Partnership marketing has become one of the most important growth channels for modern businesses, but the systems supporting it have remained fragmented," said David A. Yovanno, CEO of impact.com. "Bringing our platform, Rakuten Advertising's global scale, and Rakuten Rewards' consumer platform into a unified value proposition will make it easier for advertisers to achieve their goals with better economics, greater transparency, and measurable outcomes. This is a significant step toward a more scalable and powerful alternative to traditional performance marketing channels."

The alliance will make performance-based growth more accessible and efficient for a significantly larger universe of advertisers and partners:

• Advertisers will have greater control over how they plan, manage, and scale performance campaigns with stronger visibility, measurement, and performance for their growth programs. They will be able to reach and incentivize consumers at key moments in the shopping journey alongside deeper insight into incrementality, attribution, and return on investment.
• Publishers and creators will gain access to a unified platform and one of the industry's largest portfolios of advertisers, offers, and monetization models, with expanded opportunities across affiliate, creator, and commerce channels.

Rakuten and impact.com plan to share additional capabilities in the coming months, including at Rakuten Optimism US (May 5-6 in Scottsdale, Ariz.) and impact.com's iPX (June 9-11 in Austin).

About Rakuten International
Rakuten International is a division of Rakuten Group, Inc., a Japanese global technology leader in services that empower individuals, communities, businesses and society. Headquartered in San Mateo, California with more than 4,000 employees worldwide, the Rakuten International business portfolio includes market leaders in e-commerce, digital marketing, advertising, communications and entertainment. We create products and services that provide exceptional value by aligning members and the businesses that want to engage them in a shared community. Visit rakuteninternational.com for more information.

About impact.com
impact.com is the world's leading commerce partnership marketing platform, transforming the way businesses grow by enabling them to discover, manage, and scale partnerships across the entire customer journey. From affiliates and influencers to content publishers, brand ambassadors, and customer advocates, impact.com empowers brands to drive trusted, performance-based growth through authentic relationships. Its award-winning products—Performance (affiliate), Creator (influencer), and Advocate (customer referral)—unify every type of partner into one integrated platform. As consumers increasingly rely on recommendations from people and communities they trust, impact.com helps brands show up where it matters most. Today, over 5,000 global brands—including Walmart, Uber, Shopify, Lenovo, L'Oréal, and Fanatics—rely on impact.com to power more than 350,000 partnerships that deliver measurable business results.

Media Contacts:
Rakuten International
Carol Lee
[email protected]

impact.com
Jenna Mills
[email protected]

SOURCE Rakuten International