Israeli content recommendation company Outbrain has raised $45 million. Outbrain cofounder and CEO Yaron Galai revealed the closing of the latest financing round in a blog on the company's website but did not disclose details about investors in the fund raising other than to say that he was personally participating.
Galai wrote, "While much of the tech/finance press is busy covering the demise of unicorns and the Silicon Valley funding winter, I’m happy to announce that Outbrain has closed a new round of funding. This adds to our last round and brings it to a total of a $45 million. As with most of our previous rounds, I am personally investing in this round as well."
He outlined recent highlights, "The acquisition of Revee allows Outbrain, for the 1st time in the Content Discovery space to algorithmically maximize the revenue for publishers, and turn their audience development from a cost center to a profit center. Outbrain has built the 1st two-way chatbot technology in the Content Discovery space for powering content recommendations inside chat/messaging platforms. We announced a partnership with CNN on this technology at Facebook’s F8 conference. Being profitable in Q1, which is typically the weakest quarter for companies in our space, didn’t hurt either."
Galai concluded, "We intend to use the new investment to continue leading on product innovation, both organically, like Outbrain for Chat, and through acquisitions like Revee. As they say - hot market or cold, it’s never a bad time for great companies to raise capital."
Outbrain was founded in 2006 by Galai and General Manager Ori Lahav and was chosen as "Globes" most promising startup in 2011. In November 2014, Outbrain filed confidentially for a Nasdaq offering at a company value of $1 billion but has since preferred to raise money privately. The company has reportedly raised close to $200 million including the latest financing round.
Outbrain provides Internet content and article recommendations, sometimes called native ads, which usually appear at the bottom of websites. Outbrain's biggest rival is fellow Israeli company Taboola, which raised $117 million last year.
Outbrain has 11 offices worldwide including its development center in Netanya.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on May 11, 2016
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