Ad-tech company with programmatic mobile and multiscreen audience buying platform receives major cash injection for European/US expansion

LONDON, 9:00 am GMT, 11th March 2014 – Adbrain, an advertising technology company that has developed the world’s first truly transparent, customisable and intelligent platform for programmatic mobile and multiscreen audience buying, has raised $7.5m in Series A funding. The funding round was led by Octopus Investments; existing investors Notion Capital also participated.

Adbrain will use the funding to turbo-charge its ongoing expansion into the US and Europe, and to step up the recruitment of world-class talent to its accomplished engineering, big data and artificial intelligence teams.

Following the beta launch of its platform in February 2014, Adbrain onboarded some of the world’s most high-profile agencies and trading desks: Annalect (part of Omnicom Media Group Europe), The Exchange Lab, M&C Saatchi Mobile, Fetch and Somo.

Adbrain’s vision is to empower global advertisers with technology that allows them to leverage their data to better understand and reach mobile first, multi-screen consumers - whatever device those consumers are using.

Gareth Davies, CEO of Adbrain, commented: “Adbrain has won the backing of investors and advertisers by creating a truly transparent advertising platform in an industry accustomed to black-box and managed-service solutions. By effectively responding to consumers’ new multi-screen habits and the rapid spread of connected devices, we are defining the future of advertising. This funding will further establish our authority in the space both in Europe and the USA.

In particular, it’s an honour to be welcomed into the Octopus ‘club' and join a number of incredibly innovative and game-changing companies who are busy changing the face of their respective industries.”

The Adbrain platform is unique in the way it allows advertisers to crunch their own data with second and third-party data to create custom audience ‘segments’ they can target – while also taking advantage of advanced automated technologies like real-time bidding and programmatic audience buying.

The value of the programmatic trading industry in the UK, US and in seven other countries where it is best established will have almost tripled to $32.5bn by 2017, according to forecasters Magna Global. The UK and US markets are currently leading the way on driving the increase in programmatic trading.

Frederic Lardieg, the Ventures team at Octopus, commented, “Adbrain represents an exciting opportunity in the booming mobile sector. The ad-technology space is a multi-billion dollar market and continues to experience significant growth. Combine this with the highly motivated and impressive team behind Adbrain and it is clear that this is a company that is set to make waves. We look forward to supporting Gareth and his team, particularly through introducing them to top tier talent, as Adbrain grows over the coming months.”

Adbrain’s initial seed funding round saw it raise $1.5m from Notion Capital and a selection of renowned mobile and digital ad-technology angels in June 2013.

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