October 28, 2017 — CDK Global acquired enterprise reporting company Dashboard Dealership Enterprises (“DDE”), the company announced this week. The integration of DDE’s flagship product, Executive Eye, into the CDK platform will help CDK customers better measure their efficiency and profitability, the company says.

As part of the acquisition, DDE CEO Josh Blick and COO William Page III will join CDK.

DDE has come on strong within the last two years with more than 600 dealerships using the reporting tool, including several top 50 dealer groups. The acquisition makes sense for CDK.

As automotive dealer customers seek to have more insight into their day-to-day operations, CDK wants to provide them with a more in-depth level of business intelligence and metrics. The company hopes that with the addition of Executive Eye they will help dealers to better understand the financial health of one or multiple stores and direct attention to the areas that need it.  Reynolds and Reynolds picked up a competing reporting tool, ReverseRisk, in February 2016.

“By adding industry-leading dashboard and reporting capabilities we will immediately help CDK customers effectively measure the success of their businesses,” says Brian MacDonald, CEO of CDK Global. “The company’s experience with many of the nation’s largest dealers also gives us great confidence in taking Executive Eye to our customer base.”

The acquisition is the first of what likely will be the first of several deals for CDK over the next year. — Alison Miley