A Swiss name in a new market. So we screened 20'000 companies.
Unit8 from Zurich turns data into value for firms such as Swiss Re, Merck and Daimler. To take the step into the USA, Akquire built the full outbound setup in one quarter: market screened, signals analysed, own sending, 17 campaigns running in parallel.
- 20'000+US companies screened
- 13'800+Decision-makers reached
- 44'511Emails, each with its own opening line
- USD 6 million.about, as an opportunity in the pipeline, says Christina Hamlin
12 March 2026
In Europe, banks and insurers know the name Unit8. In the USA, hardly anyone knew it, and the local team was small. The question in the first conversation: How do we reach the people who decide on data and AI?
One quarter. Four chapters.
- 01MarketOver 20'000 US companies screened by revenue, industry, data and AI maturity and buying signals
- 02SignalThe language of Palantir Foundry only where a Palantir signal was confirmed
- 03emailsA concrete industry problem rather than a list of services
- 04VoiceWhat Unit8 took away: personas and messages, checked by industry
Market.
First look at the whole sky. Then you know which stars count.
For you A new market does not start with a bought list, but with checking each individual company.
Every company screened. Before an email went out.
For each of the more than 20'000 US companies, Akquire checked the website, revenue, industry and sub-industry, data and AI maturity, and whether it was on a blocklist in 
Clay. Only companies that fit were added to a campaign. Emails were sent through our own domains and mailboxes in the USA, warmed up and with strict limits per mailbox.
- Insurance and reinsurance
- Banks and wealth management
- Pharmaceuticals and clinical research
- Medical technology
- Industry
- Enterprise technology
Signal.
You never reach out blindly to the most valuable list.
For you Your best accounts get a dedicated campaign, and only if there is a signal to back it up.
Over 20'000 companies.
Each dot stands for a verified US company.
223 with a Palantir signal.
Companies where use of Palantir Foundry was confirmed, with 409 people named.
Only they heard about Foundry.
Unit8 is a certified partner of Palantir. This wording was used only in emails to companies with a verified signal, from June 2026 in a separate campaign for mature environments, banks and insurers first.
Clay
From 20'563 companies to the first line.
- 01 Source20'563
US companies in the Clay table «Company Master»
The company list in
Clay: website, industry, size, location and LinkedIn for each company.- AaName
- AaDomain
- AaPrimary Industry
- AaSize
- AaLocation
- AaLinkedIn URL
- 02 Check6
Questions for each company, answered by Clay AI
Each answer is recorded with a justification in its own column. Plus a cross-check against Unit8's blocklist, 519 entries.
- KIB2B Status
- KIEnterprise Threshold
- KI$1B+ Revenue Verification
- KIUnit8 Target Vertical
- KIUnit8 Competitor
- KIOutbound Fit
- ⇄DNC Domain
- 03 Research5
Signals researched by Claygent
A research agent in
Clay reads press releases, job adverts, LinkedIn and reports, and writes the finding, source and date into the table.- KIPalantir Foundry Usage
- KIRecent Data/AI Job Posting
- KIRecent Tech Initiatives
- KIAI Priority Mention
- KIRecent Major News
- Press release206
- LinkedIn151
- Job ad67
- News article20
- Earnings Call10
- 04 Palantir1'616
Contacts in the in-house Palantir table, from 211 companies
For the Palantir campaign, a separate table. At 525 contacts, the signal with product, source and topic sits directly in the row: 288 confirmed, 237 inferred.
- AISignal_Palantir_YES/NO
- AIPalantir Usage
- AITech Initiatives Snippet
- AIExpansion_Context_NEWS
- 05 People18'795
Contacts found, data and AI leads
Apollo looks for the heads of data, analytics and AI at each relevant company in the US and Canada. Clay AI checks who really makes the decisions.- ⌕Find People, Senior Data Leaders, US & Canada
- AaJob Title
- AISenior Decision-Maker
- AILead Qualification
- 06 Addresses8'923
Contacts in the master table as of 1 June
Addresses via
AI Ark, 
BetterContact and Apollo, each checked with 
Reoon: 2'984 «safe», 2'793 «catch-all».- ⌕AI-ARK
- ⌕Find work email
- ⌕Enrich person
- ✓Reoon Validation
- AaEMAIL FINAL
- 07 Text5'383
opening lines, one for each person
Clay AI writes the subject line, the opening line, the question and the matching case from Unit8 based on the research. Colleagues at the same company also get different opening lines.
- AISubject line
- AICold email opener
- AIAI scaling question
- AISolution version 2
- AIBusiness_Part
- 08 Sending44'511
Emails via
SmartleadClay assigns each person to the campaign for their industry: clinical research 1'589, banking and wealth management 1'581, Palantir 1'009, enterprise technology 981, manufacturing 590, pharma 539, insurance 388.- →Life sciences, clinical R&D
- →Banking and wealth management
- →Palantir, ALL
- →Enterprise technology
- →Manufacturing
- →Pharma and biopharma
- →Insurance and reinsurance
Figures from the tables in Clay for Unit8. 44'511 emails sent from Smartlead. Column names as in the original.
Emails.
A problem the recipient recognises. In three sentences.
For you The most precise emails brought the conversations. A concrete case from the industry beats any list of services.
One line becomes an email.
Each campaign had up to five steps and several versions of the first email. Unit8 approved each version before it went out. Here are two of them, as they were created: a real line from the Clay table, alongside the finished email. Each personal field carries the number of its column.
Clay NEW PP Final People, MasterTableUnit 8, Palantir Companies · 1'616 lines · excerpt| AaCompany_Name | AaTitle | AaFinal_First_Name | AISignal_Palantir_YES/NO | AISubject_Line | →Palantir, ALL |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| J.P. Morgan | Executive Director, Data Analytics and Intelligent Automation | First name | confirmed | Foundry | press release | driving value through data integration | AI productivity gains | ✓ Added to campaign |
| Truist | SVP, Data Platform Director | First name | suspected | Foundry | job posting | data engineering and ontology | AI receivables platform | ✓ Added to campaign |
| PayPal | Director Data Science | First name | suspected | Foundry | Reddit | fraud detection features | AI integration | ✓ Added to campaign |
Three real rows, with the people's names hidden. The signal column shows what Claygent writes: confirmed or suspected, product, source, topic.
Highlighted row
- 1⌕Final_First_Name
- First name, Executive Director, Data Analytics
- 2AaCompany_Name
- J.P. Morgan
- 3KISignal_Palantir_YES/NO
- confirmed | Foundry | press release | driving value through data integration
FromBusiness Development, Unit8
To1First name, 2J.P. Morgan
SubjectFoundry cost
Good morning 1First name, as 2J.P. Morgan 3appears to be using Palantir, is the platform creating measurable value quickly enough across teams?
In mature Foundry environments, value usually gets stuck in slow rollout, duplicated builds, unclear costs, or too much technical dependency.
Unit8 has helped teams grow usage from 2,000 to 5,000 users, reduce platform costs by 23%, cut execution times by 30-50%, and reduce incidents by 90%.
Happy to share the patterns we usually see when Foundry moves from core users into wider business adoption.
Are you the right person to check this with?
Smartlead, with the values from this row inserted. The sentence about Palantir appears only where Claygent found a signal.Clay NEW PP Final People, MasterTableUnit 8, MASTER TABLE, 01.06.26 · 8'923 rows · excerpt| AaCompany_Name | AaTitle | AICold email opener | ✓Status_Reoon | →Life sciences, clinical R&D |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Parexel International | Director, Data Governance Enablement | Caught Parexel's CEO emphasising the strategic launch of ParexelAI™ for advancing clinical development with AI innovation. | catch_all | ✓ Added to campaign |
| Parexel International | Executive Director, Data Governance | Saw Parexel's CEO announce ParexelAI to enhance clinical development with AI innovation in their recent press release. | catch_all | ✓ Added to campaign |
| Parexel International | Vice President, AI Enablement | Caught the announcement of ParexelAI™ by Parexel, showcasing their commitment to AI-driven clinical development advancements. | catch_all | ✓ Added to campaign |
Three people at the same company, three different opening lines. Written by Clay AI from the company research.
Highlighted row
- 1⌕Final_First_Name
- First name, Director, Data Governance Enablement
- 2AaCompany_Name
- Parexel International
- AITech Initiatives Snippet
- Launched ParexelAI™, delivering AI innovation to accelerate clinical development | press release | May 18, 2026
- 3AICold Email Opener
- Caught Parexel's CEO emphasising the strategic launch of ParexelAI™ for advancing clinical development with AI innovation.
FromBusiness Development, Unit8
To1First name, 2Parexel International
SubjectSDTM at 2Parexel International
Good morning 1First name,
3Noticed Parexel's CEO emphasising the strategic launch of ParexelAI™ to advance clinical development with AI innovation.
A pharmaceutical company had clinical programmers rebuilding large parts of their code for every new study.
It was repetitive, manual work that slowed delivery and pulled skilled teams away from higher-value analysis.
We built a metadata-driven solution that now automates up to 80% of SDTM code and 50% of ADaM code generation.
If you are the right person for this at 2Parexel International, would you be open to a brief conversation next week?
Smartlead. The first line comes word for word from the «Cold Email Opener» column.Tables from Clay, column names as in the original. Emails from Smartlead, signature omitted. Hovering or tapping connects a part of the email to its column.
Christina Hamlin on Akquire
«It did lead to a really good opportunity that I put in our pipeline for about $6 million. Being able to connect directly at the time that we did was super positive.»
- «We learned a lot about the personas and who we should target and how. That to me is a really big win.»
- «It was pretty genuinely attributed to what y'all did.»
- «You did go above and beyond. I know you're really invested in our success.»
- «I very much recognise and acknowledge the work that you all did.»
Christina HamlinGrowth, Unit8
From the first conversation to a constellation.
Initial consultation: the US market, accounts for large deals, a small local team.
Kick-off with the Unit8 team: case studies by industry, brand tone of voice, list of confirmed Palantir customers.
The first six campaigns: insurance in two campaigns, banks, pharmaceuticals, medical technology and clinical research.
Second round with a sharper target customer profile and new copy.
Fixed rule: Palantir and Foundry only when a signal is detected.
New sectors: industry and Enterprise Technology.
The campaign for confirmed Palantir users with mature environments, banks and insurers first.
Your next market. From zero in a quarter.
You sell data, software or consulting and want to expand to the US, Germany or the UK? Tell us who you want to reach there. We will bring an initial target group and a sample email to the strategy meeting.
- Own sending in the target marketLocal domains and mailboxes on site, your main domain remains untouched.
- Signals instead of listsWho gets which email is decided by a verified trigger, not a filter.
- Show first, pay laterFree sample with 50 decision-makers from your target customer profile, before you pay anything.
10Weitere Akquire-Fallstudien
Andere Märkte, dieselbe Methode.
Banken, Praxen, Spitäler, Medizintechnik, Personalberatung, Medien und Software. Ein Klick auf ein Logo öffnet die ganze Kampagne.
