Snapfinger finds $7M for mobile food ordering

Subsidiary of Kudzu Interactive snaps up new funding for online meal ordering

Snapfinger, a Web and mobile service for ordering takeout from chain and independent restaurants like the California Pizza Kitchen, has raised $7 million in a Series B round led by Norwest Venture Partners and supported by individual investors. The app has now raised a total of $11 million.

Snapfinger is a subsidiary of Kudzu Interactive, an Atlanta-based company pleasing investors with a unique intersection of e-commerce, mobile computing, and local search marketing. Kudzu Interactive attained profitability and increased revenues 420% in 2009.

Josh Goldman and Jeff Crowe, two general partners at Norwest, will join Kudzu Interactive’s board.

"We chose to raise capital now to solidify our leadership position and feel strongly that the next 18 months will give us the opportunity to own the online and mobile ordering space for casual dining," said Jim Garrett, founder and CEO of Kudzu Interactive.

"Snapfinger is the ordering equivalent to OpenTable’s web and mobile reservation system, only our market opportunity is about ten times as large in the US. Kudzu Interactive has more mobile applications and more restaurants integrated into more point of sale systems than all of our competitors combined."

The company boasts that it enables users access to over 28,000 restaurants from nationwide chains, in addition to some local independent businesses (they say they're starting with California). A search for Snapfinger on the iPhone App Store reveals separate apps for California Pizza Kitchen, Outback Steakhouse, Boston Market, Subway Express, Carrabba's Italian Grill, and Baja Fresh.

Garrett says there are 400,000 chain restaurants in the United States, making for a $50 billion dollar annual takeout business worth tapping into.

Mobile apps are currently available for the iPhone, Android, and Palm, and a BlackBerry app is slated for a June launch. iPad development is on the horizon too.