The new direct-deals mobile advertising marketplace Chartboost is announcing today that it has raised $2 million in Series A funding, after having just launched at the beginning of the October. Investors in this rounded included TransLink Capital, SK Telecom Ventures and XG Ventures, the latter a former investor in Tapulous before its Disney acquisition.
Chartboost, too, has a Tapulous connection, given that it was created by former Tapulous employees, Maria Alegre, now Chartboost CEO, and Sean Fannan, CTO.
The service they built is not just another ad network but a technology platform providing free ad-serving technology. Developers use the Chartboost SDK to serve ads promoting other publishers’ apps – ads which were typically set up as direct deals. But instead of mediating these direct deals through an ad network, Chartboost publishers get a 100% revenue share on the ads.
Chartboost itself operates under a freemium model: the ad-server technology is free when used for direct deals or internal cross-promotion, but the opt-in ad network offers revenue sharing with publishers. The network allows publishers to maximize the unsold direct-deals ad inventory.
Notable Chartboost publishers currently include TinyCo, Storm8, Pocket Gems, Gameview Studios, The Playforge, Funzio, OMGPOP, Com2us, Fluik Entertainment, Sunstorm Interactive, Ace Viral, Camigo Media, Neon Play, Lakoo and Devsisters.
Alegre says that the new funding will help Chartboost to scale and reach more publishers worldwide, but the company is already profitable.
