AdRoll secures US$70m in venture funding – revenues soar to US$150m

22 Apr 2014

Advertising retargeting platform AdRoll has closed a US$70m funding round led by Foundation Capital. New investors include Glenmede, Northgate Capital, Institutional Venture Partners (IVP), and Performance Equity Management.

The new investors join existing investors Merus Capital, Accel Partners and Peter Thiel.

The investment brings to US$89m the total amount raised by AdRoll so far.

AdRoll established EMEA headquarters in Dublin in October 2013 with plans to hire more than 100 employees in its first year in operation.

With 50 employees in place already, and a new, larger Dublin office due to open in June, the expansion in Europe has coincided with more than 250pc growth in EMEA customers since March 2013. 

“In just a few years, retargeting has become as essential as search engine marketing for every digital marketer,” said Aaron Bell, AdRoll CEO.

“The new funding lets us hit the gas on our ambitious vision to more broadly become the one platform for companies to better understand their customers and reach them wherever they go.

“It’s a pleasure to both bring back the close-knit investor team that has helped us scale and welcome new investors with exceptional late-stage and public experience,” Bell said.

The funding news coincides with a US$150m annualised revenue run rate for AdRoll, which now serves 15,000 customers in more than 100 countries.

Influencing 500m shoppers

Every month, AdRoll’s intelligent algorithms make more than 50bn ad bidding decisions based on the shopping behaviour of more than 500m unique shoppers.

“Display advertising spend attributed to real-time bidding is projected to exceed US$9bn by 2017,” said Charles Moldow, general manager of Foundation Capital.

“A very select group of advertising technology companies are poised to capture the majority of that spend. We’re eager to support AdRoll because they offer businesses of all sizes a single platform that unites all of their digital advertising channels and devices.”

Internet marketing image via Shutterstock

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com