NEW YORK, NY- Applicaster, the global technology company simplifying the creation, delivery and management of OTT video applications, today announced it has secured $11 million to support continued technology and customer growth amid record demand for streaming content services.
The funding round is led by Viola Growth, with participation from 83 North, Pitango, Saban Ventures, Planven Investments and La Maison. This latest round of financing brings Applicaster’s total raised to about $67 million. In March last year the groups invested $20 million in the company after it recorded 100 percent growth in annual recurring revenue.
“There has been a sea change in how we consume media, and in th-e past few months companies have looked to adapt direct-to-consumer app strategies to support this competitive OTT market,” said Eran Westman, partner at Viola Growth, who is also on Applicaster’s board. “Applicaster is uniquely positioned to meet this historic demand by providing agile and flexible solutions for its clients. We believe the category will continue to grow as will Applicaster, with its flexible and robust platform.”
Applicaster’s SaaS app management platform, Zapp, simplifies the way media companies build, manage and distribute content, reducing costs and significantly shrinking time to market.
The company last month launched Zapp’s newest framework, called Quick Brick, which streamlines the design, deployment and management of complex video apps across Android, iOS, Apple TV (tvOS), Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, and Samsung and LG TVs. The new core framework not only simplifies app development by eliminating the need for coding the visual elements of OTT apps in multiple languages, it exponentially decreases time to market across all platforms and enables agile, iterative development of apps that can quickly adapt and respond to market requirements.
“As consumer viewing habits continue to change, media brands are realizing they need to expand their OTT presence by launching on multiple TV platforms quickly,” said Applicaster Co-founder and CEO Jonathan Laor. “Applicaster is uniquely positioned to do that. Our flexible Zapp platform enables media companies and developer teams to launch quickly and update great video experiences after launch to meet increasing and evolving content demand.”
Applicaster works with a wide range of media companies and premium content providers, including: DirectTV, Viacom, Prosieben and Fox.
Delivering Personalized Customer Experiences
Increasing its own agility and responsiveness, Applicaster appointed company executive Devra Prywes to oversee Product and Marketing to remove silos to reflect a more integrated mandate for delivering personalized and innovative customer experiences.
This integrated approach reflects the company's focused mandate on global growth and customer experience. She now leads the overall business marketing strategy globally across all product lines, with a mission to transform marketing into a continuous growth driver for the organization.
Simultaneously, Applicaster is furthering investments in R&D and tech, with engineering being integrated under a unified Operations Group led by co-founder and CTO Neer Friedman.
About Applicaster
Applicaster powers the creation and optimization of customized end-user app experiences for today’s largest media companies and premium content providers. With its open APIs and extensive partner marketplace, the company’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform, Zapp, serves as an open ended resource for companies to prototype, develop and launch apps, utilize OTT services and integrate key functionalities into third-party apps. Customers such as DirecTV, Fox and Viacom are utilizing Applicaster for direct to consumer app design and delivery across mobile and connected TVs. Applicaster has offices in New York, San Jose, Miami, London and Tel Aviv. For more information, visit www.applicaster.com. For inquiries, contact sales@applicaster.com.
About Viola Growth
Founded in 2008, Viola Growth invests in Israeli-related global technology companies at their expansion stage. With the largest team of 7 partners in Israel, as well as a US presence, all with vast operational and financial experience, Viola Growth has raised over $430M AUM and invested in 23 companies. Viola Growth is a member of Viola, Israel's largest technology-focused investment group with over $3B under management. For more information visit: www.viola-group.com.