Video ad network, YuMe, announced on Wednesday it raised $25 million in funding. Menlo Ventures led the round while existing investors Accel Partners, BV Capital, DAG Ventures and Khosla Ventures also participated.
The Redwood City, Ca.-based startup has been around for about six years offering a video ad management platform – those ads you see online before, during and after videos. The company says it made available the first advertising technology to offer ad insertion into live video streaming as well.
YuMe said its ad platform saw tremendous growth last year. It’s got publishers including MSN, MSNBC, IDG Entertainment, and Glam Media using its ACE platform. The company also said it reached profitability and is now serving an average of 30 million in-stream video ads per day.
As video consumption across the Web continues to grow at rapid rates, startups like YuMe will see plenty of opportunity if they can compete with giants like Google, which has its own ad technology, or Apple, which recently purchased a mobile ad firm Quattro Wireless.
Shawn Carolan of Menlo Ventures commented, “As we evaluated all the video ad solutions on the market, we became convinced that YuMe has built the best technology in the industry in its ACE ad management platform, with its ability to optimize video advertising across all viewing environments, including IPTV, mobile and Web. The company already has demonstrated it is the market leader going into 2010 and this funding will help facilitate new technology offerings and additional expansion.”
With this new round in place, YuMe has raised a total of $46 million.
