• Share Rocket Inc

  Led · Series A · Jan 2017

  Share Rocket provides broadcasters and digital publishers with benchmarking, market intelligence, and actionable insights to quantify social media equity. Its core product delivers proprietary ratings metrics and performance scores, real-time insights, and daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly scorecards benchmarked against peers. The platform is used by newsrooms and management to measure reach and influence and has been validated by large local broadcasters. Share Rocket is described in the article as becoming the standard rating system for comparative social influence. CEO Chris Kraft said the company is focused on growth and committed to working alongside clients to enhance its real-time solution and drive improved performance and social ROI. The company announced a $5 million Series A financing led by Tribune Media, with Fox Television Stations and Capitol Broadcasting also investing.

• Dose Media

  Led · Series B · Dec 2015

  Dose Media publishes viral content across sites including dose.com and OMGFacts.com. The company, formerly known as Spartz Media, is based in Chicago. It announced that it closed a $25 million Series B financing. The round was led by Tribune Media and John Stafford’s Tayori. According to the report, Dose has raised at least $34.5 million since its seed round in 2012. The article does not provide additional operating metrics or stated future plans.

• Watchup

  Led · Equity · Nov 2014

  Watchup, founded in 2012 and led by CEO Adriano Farano, delivers personalized newscasts compiled from trusted global news sources to tablets, smartphones and other devices. The service curates content from outlets including PBS NewsHour, CNET, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and Univision. Its app is available on Apple’s App Store, Google Play, Google Glass and the Amazon App Store. The company is based in Stanford, CA and is currently hiring. Financially, Watchup has raised $4.25M to date. The product focus is on assembling a tailored TV‑style news experience across multiple consumer platforms. Watchup offers an iPad app that aggregates short video news segments into user-assembled playlists sourced from outlets such as the Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal, and Univision. Version 2.0 automated playlist assembly based on user preferences so segments start when the app opens. Co-founder Adriano Farano, a former journalist, says the company has validated its assumptions and is ready to expand to new platforms; it previously released an app for Google Glass. The product aims to create a new version of the daily newscast with an effortless, personalized video experience. Financially, Watchup announced $1 million in additional funding and previously raised $500,000 in angel funding in 2012; the company says the new money is not a Series A. Watchup is a StartX-incubated iPad video app that lets users select segments from a curated set of news channels and assemble them into automated playlists. The app currently aggregates content from 35 channels and offers premium placement partnerships with The Wall Street Journal, The Associated Press, Deutsche Welle, and The I-Files. Founders position the product as a modern ‘‘time for news’’ experience, aimed at delivering high-quality, professional news in a compact, viewable playlist. Future product plans include more personalization and automation so Watchup can surface news with minimal user effort. Live coverage is not currently planned, as the team views the live space as crowded. Financially, the company has just closed a $500,000 angel round to support its development and growth.

• Mashable

  Led · Series A · Mar 2014

  Mashable produces digital-first content for the digital generation, operating web, social and video channels and running Mashable Studios for serialized video programming and branded entertainment. The company creates content for its website, social networks, television partners and OTT platforms. Led by CEO and founder Pete Cashmore, Mashable emphasizes new formats and proprietary technologies. It recently announced plans to expand its video offerings across all platforms, including linear TV, and to grow its branded video division. The company intends to enhance its proprietary technology and data platforms and improve its premium advertising offerings. Mashable reports a dedicated audience of 45 million monthly unique visitors and 28 million social followers. Mashable is a New York City-based digital media company that provides news, information and resources for the Connected Generation. Led by founder and CEO Pete Cashmore, it operates as a digital innovation source and publishes content across formats. The company plans to use the new funding to hire more than 100 employees and invest in video production across all formats. It will also invest in its proprietary Velocity technology, which predicts and tracks the viral life cycle of digital content, and offer it to media agencies 360i and MEC, while bolstering the editorial team. Mashable reports 42 million unique visitors worldwide and 21 million social media followers. It has offices in San Francisco, Los Angeles and London. Mashable is a tech and social media blog founded in 2005 by CEO Pete Cashmore. The company operates offices in New York City and San Francisco. This year it has hired new editorial personnel and plans to expand with offices in Los Angeles and London to build a global presence. Mashable finalized its first outside funding with a $14M Series A. The round added nearly $1M to the $13.3M the company had reported earlier in the year, bringing total disclosed funding to $14M.

• Perfect Market

  Participated · Equity · Jan 2011

  Perfect Market provides technology and services that help publishers generate web traffic and monetize content by optimizing articles and matching contextually relevant searches and ads. Its system analyzes millions of articles — over 17 million — to generate search queries that direct readers to the right stories while avoiding contextual ad mismatches. Today the product addresses text content primarily, and the company aims to grow its video content optimization business this year. Management said new funding will be used partly for sales and operations to support more customers and partly to further develop the platform, including tools or acquisitions to capitalize on location-based and mobile trends. The company reports five quarters of growth in revenue, page views and customer acquisitions, and its optimized content attracts about 30 million monthly page views. Customers have included the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune and Orlando Sentinel. Perfect Market develops proprietary technology to match intent-driven search visitors with optimized publisher content and relevant ads. The company says this approach generates higher click-through rates for advertisers and dramatically more revenue for publishers and ad network partners. It was incubated by Idealab and Tribune Company has used Perfect Market’s solutions on several of its web properties in 2009. Perfect Market plans to use the $6 million Series C to expand marketing and deployment of its solution to newspaper, magazine and website publishers. Existing investors Trinity Ventures, Rustic Canyon Partners and Idealab participated in the round. The company’s initial financing totaled $15.6 million and closed in July 2008; the size and timing of a Series B were not disclosed in reporting.

No current team members are available.