Outbrain operates content-recommendation widgets that display sponsored links beneath news articles on publishers such as CNN, Le Monde and The Washington Post. The company runs an open-web advertising platform that generates revenue by serving clickbait-style sponsored links to third-party websites. Outbrain has filed for an IPO and said the recent $200 million financing should be its last traditional private round ahead of going public. In its IPO filing Outbrain reported $767 million in revenue for 2020 and $228 million in revenue for Q1 2021, with net income of $4.4 million in 2020 and $10.7 million in Q1 2021. The company was previously in talks to merge with rival Taboola but that merger was canceled; Taboola went public via a SPAC. Outbrain’s leadership says it plans to continue delivering innovation to premium media partners worldwide and expand its global advertising platform as the advertising market recovers. Outbrain is an online content discovery platform that delivers personalized online, mobile and video content to audiences while enabling publishers to better understand their audiences through data. The platform serves 200 billion personalized content recommendations per month and reaches over 561 million unique visitors globally. Top-tier publications using Outbrain include CNN, ESPN, Le Monde, Fox News, The Guardian, Slate, The Telegraph, New York Post, Times of India and Sky News. The company intends to use new funding for product innovation both organically and through acquisitions. Outbrain recently acquired Los Angeles-based software company Reeve to algorithmically maximize revenue for publishers. Founded in 2006, the company is based in New York City. Outbrain operates a content-recommendation platform that places organic and paid story suggestions (including sponsored content) on publisher pages. The service is installed on more than 100,000 sites and works with a network of about 700 premium publishers, including CNN, Hearst, Rolling Stone, and Fast Company. Outbrain says it serves roughly 100 billion recommendations each month. The company monetizes by including sponsored content alongside organic recommendations. Leadership says the next year’s priorities are scaling the business, building out mobile and self-serve products, and expanding into new markets. The company recently hired its first CFO as it evaluates growth and potential public-market options. Outbrain is a content discovery platform that helps online publishers recommend additional content through a widget using contextual analysis, collaborative filtering and personalization. The system personalizes links based on cookies without tying recommendations to personally identifiable information and does not share data across publishers. It serves inbound links to a publisher's own content (unpaid) and outbound links to other sites that are paid for by Outbrain's buyers and involve revenue sharing. Outbrain's recommendations are viewed more than 3.5 billion times per month and generate over 200 million monthly clicks; mobile already accounts for about 5%–10% of its business. The company has soft-launched video recommendation technology and offers an Outbrain for Mobile widget to link to mobile-optimized content. Outbrain says it will use additional funding to invest in business development and global expansion, building on its acquisition of Surphace and offices in London, Paris and Hamburg, with further moves into Europe and Asia planned. Outbrain provides an online content-recommendation service for publishers that recommends content links to increase page views, generate revenue and enhance user experience. The core service is free for publishers and is used by outlets such as USA Today, iVillage, Boston.com, Chicago Tribune, Newsweek, TheStreet, The Boston Globe and Slate. The company recently acquired Surphace Inc. (formerly Sphere) and said it will invest in advancing its recommendation technologies. Outbrain plans to use new funding to scale operations, expand business development and sales teams in the United States, and continue growth in Israel and across Europe. Founded in 2006 by Yaron Galai and Ori Lahav, Outbrain has R&D in Netanya, Israel and is New York–based. To date the company has raised $29M.

Total raised

$331M

Funding rounds

6

Latest round

Debt Financing

Latest activity

Jul 2021