ARM, AI, Usage: 2025 in Review

Welcome to The Margin, a newsletter designed to keep you on the leading edge of monetization.

In business, the difference between being ahead of the curve or slow to adapt is anything but marginal. The Margin aims to be the most useful, timely, and incisive ping that hits your inbox all week. It includes critical research and analyst insights to inform short and long-term decision making.

Stripe Acquires Metronome – The Critical Importance of Timing

On December 2, 2025, Metronome announced it signed a definitive agreement to be acquired by Stripe, subject to customary closing conditions. Metronome will likely be embedded in Stripe’s product suite, while continuing to sell and support customers looking for standalone metering. MGI was early in declaring Metronome and other “metering/usage billing” products as functional add-ons to broader billing and monetization solutions. Metronome is not the first vendor of this type to be acquired. In fact, the majority of Metronome’s metering cohort are no longer independent or actively pursuing the space. See MGI analysis and ratings of Togai (acquired by Zuora), Amberflo (pivoted out of metering/usage billing earlier this year), OpenMeter (acquired by Kong in September), Octane (metering/usage billing tool acquired by Stripe), and the still-independent M3ter. This deal is to-date the strongest signal of Stripe’s strategic commitment to the agile billing software market.

This M&A transaction is also a vivid illustration of current market conditions for venture-backed software suppliers, underscoring the importance of: A) a strong AI story, B) exceptional growth, and C) being within reach of profitability. Companies primarily lacking in A, and/or B and C will find it challenging to attract follow-on financing. In pursuing this transaction when they did, both Stripe’s and Metronome’s founders and investors clearly demonstrated a keen understanding of the importance of timing in strategic combinations. From Metronome’s point of view, hyper growth does not last forever – especially in a highly competitive field. For Stripe, time-to-market and ability to retain strategic accounts clearly outweigh near-term financial costs.

Stripe (MGI 360 Rating: 57.3 and A grade) continues to invest in its Billing and Revenue offerings. This deal bolsters Stripe’s metering capability and gives it a larger share of existing customer spend. Notably, it solidifies the economic relationship with key growth accounts (e.g., OpenAI). It does not however fill Stripe’s need for deeper billing functionality to serve customers with moderate to complex billing requirements. Metronome may help Stripe keep customers longer and reduce churn, but it does not address Stripe’s fundamental shortcomings when it comes to serving more complex billing requirements.

Metronome (MGI 360 Rating: 45 and B- grade) offers a metering tool with integration to Stripe’s billing product. Metronome claims notable AI companies as customers and attracted the attention of AI start-ups seeking a metering tool to integrate directly into their core product. For extreme growth companies like OpenAI, Stripe’s scale and ownership will provide more comfort (and presumably less risk) as these customers grow and rely more heavily on Metronome’s product.

Metronome raised $128 million in total, with a $50 million series C closed in February of this year. It’s unlikely all of that cash was actually spent. Terms of the deal are undisclosed. Our analysis is that Metronome holders will receive a mix of some cash, Stripe stock, and earnout at a strategic valuation multiple. Metronome investors are likely getting their money back (plus a guaranteed rate of return) and swapping Metronome shares for the more valuable Stripe equity. Metronome’s recent rounds were led by NEA with participation from a16z and General Catalyst. Stripe’s disclosed investors include a16z and General Catalyst (among many others), meaning the investor overlap likely helped transaction generation, building of a strategic rationale, and diligence.

Quick notes:

This quickly expands Metronome’s channel reach, and bolsters Stripe billing. It does not address Stripe’s major functional gaps in billing and invoicing. The transaction also helps Stripe to solidify its ICP for more complex Billing scenarios moving forward
Stripe’s mature sales team will have greater leverage in converting early-adopter Metronome customers into large, paying accounts.
Stripe will need to rationalize a few points of functional overlap between Metronome and Stripe Billing
Metronome investors are clear winners
Joint customers get stronger partner (Stripe) to lean on

Stripe bolsters position as payments and billing provider to start-up and growth-stage PLG companies. This will force low-end billing solutions to find new ways to differentiate.

Stripe Billing – with a billing product with modest functionality – is on a trajectory to become the largest supplier of standalone billing solutions by revenue by 2030.

Webinar: Year in Review/Year Ahead

December 11, 2025 · 8:00 AM PT / 11:00 AM ET

2025 has been a pivotal year for monetization, billing, CPQ, CLM, and the broader revenue technology landscape. Market momentum shifted as leaders are pulling away from laggards, vendor consolidation accelerated, and AI-driven anxieties are reshaping expectations for buyers, vendors, and investors.

Join MGI analysts for our annual Year in Review/Year Ahead, where we’ll break down:

What are the budget and spending trends going into 2026?
Will AI become production ready and predictable in 2026?
Major M&A moves and what they signal about the trajectory for 2026
Leadership changes and strategy resets that will affect product roadmaps in 2026
If (when) the AI valuation bubble bursts, so what?
What are MGI’s low probability/high impact Top Ten Events to Watch in 2026?

If you follow the revenue technology ecosystem, or you’re making strategic decisions for 2026, this is the briefing you don’t want to miss.

Register: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/8017618325145/WN_FHSc9d4bSi2c0Sy0EG_wUA

The Definitive Competitive View of the ARM Market

Automated Revenue Management (ARM) Top 30 Buyer’s Guide

The ARM market is changing fast. Buyer requirements are rising, AI is reshaping product roadmaps, and revenue complexity is accelerating across industries. The result: a widening gap between market leaders and the rest of the field.

The Automated Revenue Management Top 30 Buyer’s Guide provides the clearest picture yet of this shifting landscape. Through MGI 360 Ratings™ and MarketLens™ analysis, the guide evaluates each supplier across product depth, management strength, strategy, channels, and financial health—revealing who is scaling, who is innovating, and who risks falling behind.

Sixteen vendors, including Zuora, Workday, SAP, RightRev, BillingPlatform, Maxio, Ayara Inc, Certinia, Sage Intacct, Inc., Chargebee, NetSuite, Tabs, RecVue, Zone & Co, Rillet, and Gotransverse, received full 360 Ratings™. Fourteen others, such as Aptitude Software, Stripe, OneBill, Recurly, Rev.io, Zenskar, andZoho, are profiled as Honorable Mentions.

For ARM buyers, partners, vendors, and investors, the guide provides critical insight into where the market is headed and how suppliers stack up.

Download the Guide: https://mgiresearch.com/research/automated-revenue-management-top-30-buyers-guide-2025

The Margin Podcast

Transforming Professional Services: Dan Brown on Pragmatic AI

In this episode of The Margin, MGI Research Managing Director Igor Stenmark speaks with Dan Brown, Chief Product Officer at Celonis, about the true impact of generative AI on professional services. Is it an existential threat, or a powerful accelerant? Drawing on experience at Microsoft and leading PSA vendors, Dan unpacks where GenAI delivers real value, where it falls short, and how firms can adopt a “pragmatic AI” strategy focused on impact, ease of deployment, and closed-loop feedback. They also explore the risks of AI hallucinations, pricing pressure, and why automation doesn’t replace trust.

What You’ll Learn:

Why GenAI is both an accelerant and a risk for services firms
Where AI actually delivers value in professional services today
Why trust, opinion-based work, and counterfactual thinking remain stubbornly human
How rising expectations, tooling overload, and talent shortages are shaping AI adoption
The “Pragmatic AI” framework used inside leading services and software organizations

Listen to this episode on all major podcast platforms and on the MGI website: https://mgiresearch.com/podcast/transforming-professional-services-dan-brown-on-pragmatic-ai

In Case You Missed It:

Impact of Gen AI on Quote-to-Cash and Monetization

In our latest webinar, MGI Research analysts Andrew Dailey and Igor Stenmark explored one of the biggest questions facing revenue leaders today: How will Generative AI reshape quote-to-cash, monetization strategy, and the underlying tools that power them?

Key insights from the discussion:

AI-first is becoming table stakes: positioning around “AI-first” has a short shelf life; soon, every company will embed AI into products, services, and revenue operations.
Usage pricing is accelerating: consumption-based models are becoming a core part of pricing portfolios as companies use usage to support price discovery and mask price increases.
Productivity is the first wave: GenAI is already improving tasks across pricing, packaging, billing, and collections, even as organizations grapple with uneven adoption.
Tooling gaps create real risk: most monetization systems aren’t yet ready to deliver predictability, accuracy, and transparency in usage-based models at scale.
Data quality is destiny: trust in AI outcomes depends on clean, dynamic data; without strong mediation, normalization, and governance, AI can amplify existing errors.

Bottom line:

GenAI won’t replace quote-to-cash but companies that inject AI into their monetization stack can expect meaningful gains in speed, precision, and competitiveness.

Watch the replay and get the full analysis: https://mgiresearch.com/webinar/impact-of-gen-ai-on-quote-to-cash-and-monetization/

Industry News

Conga Builds its Executive Leadership Team for Next Phase of Growth

Conga announced several senior leadership appointments intended to support its next phase of expansion across CLM, CPQ, and document workflow solutions. The additions reflect the company’s focus on scaling operations, accelerating product innovation, and integrating upcoming acquisitions, particularly in pricing and revenue technologies. Conga intends on merging with the B2B CPQ and Pricing portion of PROS Holdings in a transaction expected to close in 1H2026.

Coupa Launches New AI Agents to Accelerate Source-to-Pay ROI Featuring Autonomous Sourcing, Collaboration, and Orchestration

Coupa introduced a suite of AI-driven agents aimed at automating key processes across the source-to-pay cycle. The new capabilities focus on autonomous sourcing, contract and supplier collaboration, and workflow orchestration—positioning Coupa to expand AI use cases within procurement, finance, and contract operations.

DealHub Acquires Subskribe, Extending its Capabilities in Quote-to-Revenue Capabilities

DealHub acquired Subskribe, a billing and revenue-management product, with the intention of bringing a suite of monetization functionality to its existing customers and prospects. The move continues a broader consolidation trend as vendors seek end-to-end monetization platforms offering a wider array of functionality.

Icertis Acquires Legal Tech Startup Dioptra to Boost Contract Automation Tools

Icertis completed its acquisition of Dioptra, a legal-tech provider specializing in AI-enabled redlining, negotiation workflows, and legal playbook automation. The deal expands Icertis’ contract-intelligence capabilities and underscores growing investment in agentic and generative AI for legal and contracting teams.

Provus and Kantata Announce Strategic Partnership to Solve Revenue Leakage in Professional Services

Provus (AI-driven services CPQ) and Kantata (SaaB/PSA platform) formed a partnership integrating estimation, scoping, and project-delivery data. The combined workflow aims to reduce margin erosion by aligning quoting, resourcing, and delivery processes—an area of increasing importance for services organizations under-utilization and profitability pressure.

Salesforce Completes Acquisition of Informatica

Salesforce closed its acquisition of Informatica, bringing the data-integration and governance portfolio into Salesforce’s broader Data Cloud and AI strategy. The deal expands Salesforce’s ability to support enterprise-scale data pipelines, a foundational requirement for AI-driven sales, service, CPQ, and revenue-operations applications.

Zuora Launches New Monetization Catalog

Zuora introduced its new Monetization Catalog, designed to help organizations configure, package, and iterate on pricing and offer structures more quickly. The catalog centralizes monetization logic across subscriptions, usage, and hybrid models, reflecting increased demand for rapid experimentation and scalable pricing governance. This is a significant step forward for Zuora and will enable a more robust monetization architecture and go-to-market strategy.

Upcoming Events

NRF 2026: Retail’s Big Show

January 11-13, 2026
New York, NY

MWC26 Barcelona

March 2-5, 2026
Barcelona

Conga Connect 2026

March 9-11, 2026
Orlando, FL

So What Have I Missed?

Our most recent and relevant research that will help you keep your finger on the pulse of AMP disciplines.

The Evergreen Archives

Curated past research that is still pertinent today.

That’s it for this issue of The Margin. If you’ve made it this far, we’ll certainly see you next time.

Warm wishes,

MGI Research