Twilio is rumoured to be planning an acquisition of customer relationship management (CRM) startup Segment in a deal worth $3.2 billion (£2.45 billion). 

Twilio, which currently has a market cap of $43.83 billion, has agreed to buy Segment in a deal that could be officially announced as soon as this week, according to Forbes. The acquisition would be Twilio’s largest to date, following its $2 billion takeover of SendGrid in 2018.

Twilio’s technology allows developers to build software that can make and receive phone calls, send and receive text messages, and perform other communication functions using its web service APIs. The company, which counts Twitter, Uber, and Amazon’s Twitch among its customers, has seen its stock price triple since the beginning of the year as companies rushed to modernise their apps and services during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Segment, which boasts big-name customers including VMware, Trivago and IBM, provides a set of APIs to pull together customer data from a variety of sources, including CRM tools, customer service applications, and websites. However, the company hasn’t fared so well during the pandemic, with Segment laying off 10% of its 550 staff in May in anticipation of a “tougher IT spending environment”.

However, the company said in September that it now has over 20,000 customers, up from 19,000 at the time of the layoffs.

It’s believed Twilio will use the acquisition to expand beyond its core communications capabilities to create customised ads or emails using data gathered using Segment’s technology.

A Twilio spokesperson told Forbes that it does not comment “on any rumors or speculation”, and Segment also declined to comment on the rumour.