Ad network Tumri shifts course with new $15M
Tumri, an online advertising company that allows brands to fine-tune their ads for different audiences, has taken a new direction, replacing its CEO and CFO and launching a new product in the space of months. To support this shift, it has also closed its second round of funding at $15 million.
The Mountain View, Calif., company used to offer an advertising network that targeted products to online shoppers based on site context. Today, it offers a platform for advertisers to tweak single parts of ads for different audiences. For example, a software company could change only its art, or only its tagline for sites targeting younger consumers, and run the same ads with the same pricing and content but different art and taglines on sites targeting older users. On top of that, the Tumri platform allows brands to track the performance of each individual part of an ad, so they know exactly what to adjust for better performance with a particular audience.
With so many advertising networks competing for the same business, these capabilities could buoy Tumri above the fray. At the same time, display advertising took a hit with the downturn (even though it’s reportedly on the upswing now). The company says its plan is to recruit premium clients to weather any fresh challenges in the space. It already benefits from several bigwig clients, including Hewlett-Packard, Sears and Intercontinental Hotels Group. Its investors are also nothing to sneeze at — $10 million came from Time Warner Investments, Accel Partners, Tenaya Capital and Shasta Ventures. Silicon Valley Bank chipped in the other $5 million in debt — bringing Tumri’s total funds raised to $31.5 million.
The company says it will use the new funding to beef up its sales and marketing operations and to potentially expand overseas. This will fall under the jurisdiction of new CEO Calvin Lui, who took the reins from Hari Menon last January. He had served as vice president of business development at Netblue. New CFO Jeff McCombs joined Tumri from Yahoo, where he was chief of staff for president Sue Decker. Former AOL senior vice president Michael Peralta has also come aboard as chief revenue officer.
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About the Author, Camille Ricketts
Camille is the lead writer for GreenBeat. She came to VentureBeat from Google where she worked on its traditional platforms team, particularly in TV. Before that, she was a reporter for the Wall Street Journal in New York and London. Follow her on Twitter at @camillericketts, and follow VentureBeat on Twitter at @venturebeat.