• Ensighten

  Led · Equity · Oct 2015

  Ensighten provides an omni-channel data and tag management platform comprising enterprise tag management, mobile app deployment and optimization, and customer profile creation and activation. It has launched a patented, real-time, no-SDK mobile app optimization and deployment platform that lets marketers boost in-app conversion, engagement and loyalty without repeating app certification. The platform integrates with nearly 1,000 digital marketing vendor integrations across analytics, advertising, e-mail, marketing automation, personalization and search. Clients include Microsoft, Capital One, United Airlines and T-Mobile. The company is led by CEO Josh Manion and has offices in San Jose, San Diego, London and Sydney. It intends to use the newly raised funds to accelerate innovation and sales of its platform. Ensighten offers an Agile Marketing Platform that serves and manages website tags and enables customers to own, collect, and act on data in real time. Its platform processes tag requests from 30,000 web domains representing $30 billion in annual e‑commerce transactions. Customers include Microsoft, Safeway, and Wal‑Mart. CEO Josh Manion says the market is evolving from tag management to data activation, with demand for real‑time data action. The company was previously described as a CDN for tags that makes tag serving faster and more scalable. Ensighten raised a $40 million Series B and plans to use the proceeds to expand global sales and marketing and continue product development; it had raised a $15.5 million Series A in 2012. Ensighten delivers tags (cookies, pixels, JavaScript snippets) as a service, operating a CDN-style platform that serves only the right tags when needed. This approach reduces page load times and simplifies tag management across many properties. The company also offers mobile-specific solutions to handle inconsistent data connections on mobile platforms. Ensighten targets large enterprise customers managing thousands of tags, enabling marketing teams to make changes without lengthy IT involvement. CEO Josh Manion says the product improves marketing agility and speeds deployment of new tools. The company announced a $15.5M Series A and plans to use the funding for continued global expansion and increased marketing, having opened European offices in April.

• Sightly

  Led · Seed · Jan 2014

  Sightly provides a platform that enables businesses to create and scale localized online video ad campaigns across multiple networks, including YouTube. Its proprietary technology inserts region-specific elements such as maps, addresses, contact information and promotional offers into videos, and the platform offers automated bidding, budget allocation and data‑driven audience refinements. Sightly is a certified Google AdWords partner and says clients can create campaigns that reach customers within 72 hours. The company plans to use its $1.7M seed round to expand beyond small- and medium-sized businesses to target brands, agencies and value-added resellers, and will debut an enterprise video ad platform next month at the International Franchise Association convention in New Orleans. Founded as Pixelfish in 2006 by John McIntyre and John Zdanowski and based in California, Sightly previously raised $5.6M in December 2012. The article cites rapid online-ad growth (32.4% in 2013), indicating a favorable market backdrop for the company’s expansion. Sightly operates a local mobile video advertising platform that creates short, 15-second promotional videos for small businesses and places them on YouTube and mobile search via AdWords. The company focuses on helping SMBs be discovered by consumers on mobile devices and social media through targeted local video spots. Sightly offers PaaS-style services including campaign customization, an analytics dashboard, campaign reporting, and regular campaign email blasts. It is a certified Google AdWords partner and can launch local search advertising campaigns that target consumers searching for businesses within 72 hours. The product emerged from the relaunch of PixelFish after the company sold its corporate video production division and original name to focus exclusively on local video for SMBs. Sightly says it will use new capital to expand the reach and functionality of its mobile video platform.

• OneSpot

  Participated · Series A · Nov 2013

  OneSpot is focused on “content advertising,” packaging brands’ text and video content (and positive mentions) as standard display ad units. Its Content Sequencing Engine tracks where viewers are in the customer journey and targets ads accordingly. The company describes itself as a “giant CMS for content marketers,” aiming to help brands amplify created content to broader audiences. OneSpot has made several hires, including CEO Steve Sachs and CMO Adam Weinroth, and counts customers such as Johnson & Johnson, Rackspace, Domo, and Remington. The company raised a $5.3M Series A to expand sales and marketing efforts and continue product development. The Series A brought OneSpot’s total funding to $6.8M, and Mohr Davidow’s Bryan Stolle joined the board. OneSpot repackages a brand’s content feed and other editorial posts into standard banner ads and distributes them across a larger ad network. The platform pipes in all content automatically (and allows manual additions), then targets ads to viewers using cookie-based tracking and funnel-aware retargeting. The company argues that editorial content is more effective than traditional ads and emphasizes building relationships over time before driving conversion. OneSpot began as a news aggregation service but has refocused on promoting brand content as ads. Early customers include Remington, which reported improved ROI on display campaigns. Financially, OneSpot has just raised $1.5 million in new funding to support its strategy. OneSpot is an Austin, Texas–based web content curation company that helps web publishers offer links to relevant news items from across the internet through embeddable widgets. Its core product is a widget-based curation system that delivers contextually relevant links to site visitors. The service targets publishers seeking to augment site content and keep readers engaged by aggregating external news and links. The article does not provide operating metrics such as revenue or user counts. Financially, OneSpot has raised a $4.2 million Series A to support product development and market growth. Returning investors named in the article include Mike Maples and Pat Horner.

• PixelFish

  Participated · Series B · Jul 2011

  PixelFish provides a SaaS platform that enables local businesses and their marketing partners to create, distribute, and optimize online video. The company targets small-to-medium sized local businesses as well as national businesses with a local presence. PixelFish plans to use the new capital to build out its technology initiatives and to bolster its sales and marketing programs and teams to meet growing demand for online video. Within the past 90 days the company acquired the local business directory CitySquares to better match local deals and services with user interests. PixelFish is a privately held company based in Torrance, California. The company has been recognized in industry rankings, including being named a Top 300 Startup by fundedIDEAS. PixelFish is a full-service video production firm based in Torrance, CA, performing pre-, field- and post-production as well as media delivery. The company produces ads, corporate and local business profiles, product demos and training/education videos for small and large businesses with varying budgets. PixelFish launched in 2001 and re-branded as PixelFish in April 2006. According to an S.E.C. regulatory filing, the company raised $2.1M in equity funding. The filing names no participating investors; investors remained undisclosed. The article does not provide additional financial metrics, valuation, or stated future plans.

No current team members are available.