Exclusive: Mobile advertising company 4INFO has raised an additional $14 million in funding led by Paul G. Allen’s Vulcan Capital, with Mitsui Global Investment and existing investors Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Gannett, Mezzanine Capital and U.S. Venture Partners participating. This brings 4INFO’s total funding to $52 million.
Founded in 2005, 4INFO has dominated the SMS ad space, with roughly 3,000 publishers on its msgHaven platform. For those unfamiliar with their B2B product, 4INFO’s publishing platform helps publishers manage their SMS content and delivery. MsgHaven delivers around 400 million text messages each month (which has doubled in the past year).
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The value of mobile advertising networks is well established at Google and Apple: Google bought Admob for $750 million and Apple bought Quattro Wireless for $275 million. So far though the independent ad networks have stayed on the sideline.
Until now. A source tell us that ValueClick (NASDAQ: VCLK) has acquired mobile advertising network Greystripe for $75 million in cash.
Greystripe has raised $18.1 million in funding to date over four rounds. They have a direct sales force that sells rich mobile ads directly to brands, and are on pace to bring in $25 million – $30 million in revenue this year, with about $6 million in gross profit. → Read More
Mobile advertising company 4INFO has made a key hire today. The company has added advertising exec Ray Colwell as chief revenue officer.
Most recently, Colwell was the vice president of national and direct sales at display ad network Collective. Colwell has helped to create mobile campaigns for brands including Discovery, Bank of America, Procter & Gamble and Ford and was previously vice president of mobile video ad network Transpera (which was recently acquired by Tremor Media). → Read More
In its ongoing quest to be more than the “King of SMS,” 4INFO has reached a major milestone.
In a recent Nielsen report for US mobile display advertising, 4INFO tallied more than 63 million uniques for the month of September, or roughly 75% of the market. That put them in second place, ahead of Microsoft’s Extended Ad Network, Quattro, AdMob and Jumptap. Millennial was number one with 72 million uniques. → Read More
4INFO CEO Zaw Thet is trying to shed the title, “King of SMS.”
The mobile advertising company dominates the US SMS market, delivering some 400 million text messages each month (its monthly rate has roughly doubled from early 2010)— but Thet is tired of his crown, or rather, he’s eyeing a different one. 4INFO is trying to position itself as the largest mobile advertiser, SMS and beyond, and the company is ready to acquire other players to get it there.
The first part of this (some might say overly ambitious) campaign is its acquisition of Butter, a company that specializes in creating customized mobile solutions and ad campaigns for the iPhone and Android platform. The all-stock deal, announced this Tuesday, is a modest takeover— a source believes Butter’s valuation didn’t break seven-figures— but it embodies 4INFO’s major shift in strategy. Thet discusses the value of Butter, his acquisition strategy, potential suitors, and why they’re on track to quintuple (possibly sextuple) revenues in the video ahead. → Read More
4INFO CEO Zaw Thet is trying to shed the title, “King of SMS.”
The mobile advertising company dominates the US SMS market, delivering some 400 million text messages each month (its monthly rate has roughly doubled from early 2010)— but Thet is tired of his crown, or rather, he’s eyeing a different one. 4INFO is trying to position itself as the largest mobile advertiser, SMS and beyond, and the company is ready to acquire other players to get it there.
The first part of this (some might say overly ambitious) campaign is its acquisition of Butter, a company that specializes in creating customized mobile solutions and ad campaigns for the iPhone and Android platform. The all-stock deal, announced this Tuesday, is a modest takeover— a source believes Butter’s valuation didn’t break seven-figures— but it embodies 4INFO’s major shift in strategy. Thet discusses the value of Butter, his acquisition strategy, potential suitors, and why they’re on track to quintuple (possibly sextuple) revenues in the video ahead. → Read More
Now that Apple has rolled out its very own mobile app advertising program, iAd –hey, better name than iPad, at least –and Verizon is making a rival tablet, the advertising industry is poised for disruption. Whoever can best use geo-local data to deliver realtime relevancy will make advertisers very happy. Ads will get more interesting and interactive on elegant devices.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Big ad budgets are moving online, where brands are trying to figure out how to make display ads work for them the way search ads work for direct marketers. There is a whole array of new targeting techniques, not to mention social marketing campaigns that build buzz across YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and beyond. It’s all very confusing. So we’re assembling some of the smartest people we know in advertising to discuss these changes at Disrupt, our technology and media conference taking place May 24-26 in NYC. → Read More
The mobile advertising space got white hot last year when Google agreed to purchase AdMob and Apple bought Quattro Wireless. Suddenly all eyes were on 4INFO, which has been described as the AdMob of SMS. They dominate that space, and the service is doubling in size every quarter now.
I interviewed CEO Zaw Thet in February to better understand the 4INFO business. 4INFO offers customers a publishing platform, which is tools to manage SMS subscribers and send them content. They also run an ad network for SMS ads, and a SMS gateway to handle the carrier relationships and charges. 4INFO’s larger publishers pay as much as $15,000 per month to use the platform. Those publishers can run their own ads, or use 4INFO’s ads with a revenue split (self service customers have no choice but to accept 4INFO’s ads). → Read More
A couple of weeks ago we reported that Google was taking the unprecedented step of reaching out to AdMob competitors to get their support around their acquisition of the company.
The FTC is looking very hard at the deal, and some consumer groups have lobbied the FTC to block it. Despite the fact that Apple acquired AdMob’s closest rival, Quattro Wireless.
But at least one of AdMob’s competitors, 4INFO, is supporting the deal (see our recent interview with 4INFO CEO Zaw Thet here).
In a letter to the FTC, Thet says “I have no concerns about my ability to compete effectively after the transaction closes,” and “this is such a rapidly growing and evolving industry that I have no concers about Google and AdMob dominating the space.” → Read More
When Google bought mobile ad network AdMob for $750 million in November 2009, 4IFNO CEO Zaw Thet said that he received a couple of phone calls from investment bankers and potential buyers who where were sniffing around the space. When Apple bought Quattro Wireless for $275 million two months later, he says his phone started to ring off the hook.
Why? Because 4INFO is usually described as the AdMob of SMS advertising. That isn’t a very good description of the company, but it’s enough to make everyone think that the company is next in line to close a big acquisition. And that last part just may be true.
The company, which has raised around $40 million in venture capital, is where companies go when they want to create a “mailing list” of SMS subscribers. For example – when Zynga began testing SMS notifications in December, they turned to 4INFO to power the product. 4INFO has 250 premier publishers, plus a couple of thousand more that use its self service platform. → Read More
Mobile media company 4INFO has taken funding from the NBC-GE joint venture Peacock Equity and a signed a provider deal with NBC. 4INFO is the sixth Peacock Equity investment since the $250 million fund was established in April. Under the deal, 4INFO will become NBC Universal’s preferred mobile SMS advertising partner, providing technology and services that will enable NBC Universal “to offer dynamic, targeted advertising in its text messaging content.” NBC Universal will also be able to supplement its own alerts content offerings with 4INFO consumer services such as health tips, fantasy sports player statistics and custom, user-defined alerts. San Mateo based 4INFO was founded in 2004 and includes amongst its investors Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Gannett Company, Sand Hill Capital and U.S. Venture Partners. The Peacock Equity investment is 4INFO’s 5th round, with the company having taken $8 million Series C in March 2005 and $10 million Series D in June this year. The amount of Peacock Equity’s investment was not disclosed. CrunchBase Information 4Info Information provided by CrunchBase → Read More
Today 4INFO has announced that it has completed a $10 million Series D found of funding led by Gannet, Co. Inc. Since the carefree days of VC money flowing are a thing of the past, we’re certain 4INFO will put this funding to good use, and the company plans to use the money for product development and to expand its sales and distribution teams, while trying to grow into a profitable company. “We’re proud to have the opportunity to build on our relationship with Gannett, a visionary company that is leading traditional media’s expansion into the mobile sphere,” said 4INFO CEO Zaw Thet. “Gannett’s support enables 4INFO to continue to advance our business of providing useful, timely information to consumers via their mobile phones and marketers with a unique way to reach an engaged mobile audience.” As a provider of SMS based mobile search and alter services, 4INFO offers free access to real-time sports scores, 411, stock quotes, weather updates, horoscopes and other content. The SMS Publishing Platform allows print and online publishers to mobilize their content. 4INFO → Read More
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