Artificial intelligence advertising firm LoopMe has won an additional $10m funding, a total of $17 million to date, as machine learning becomes a vital part of digital marketing.
The new funding was received from Impulse VC and Harbert European Growth Capital to support global growth and continued investment in artificial intelligence technology. Existing investors Holzbrinck Ventures and Open Ocean Capital also participated in the round. LoopMe now counts investment from UK, Germany, Finland, North America, China and Russia, signaling global support for its AI technology.
LoopMe’s AI technology learns how people feel about and react to advertising, and changes their advertising experience based on their individual feedback loop.
Since receiving its previous round of funding in 2015, LoopMe reached profitability for the full year 2016, more than doubled its sales revenue and team size, opened offices in LA, Bangalore, Johannesburg and Moscow, and invested heavily in its technology. The expansion is set to continue in 2017, with offices opening in Amsterdam, Singapore and Chicago.
“LoopMe is using AI to improve the quality of brand advertising on mobile devices. Its data science team has worked with AI for over 15 years at the highest level and the results with large brand advertisers are very compelling.” Said Grigory Firsov co-founder, Impulse VC.
“The mobile video advertising industry will overtake desktop next year to be worth $17 billion in the US alone. LoopMe have a credible track record of growth which creates a compelling investment opportunity for Harbert to support Stephen and Marco with future expansion” said Johan Kampe, Senior Managing Director.
“AI driven video ads are the future of brand marketing. LoopMe’s technology opens up a window into people’s thoughts and feelings, discovering what they like and dislike, which elements can trigger a reaction or a measurable, physical and emotional response.” said CEO & Co-Founder Stephen Upstone. ‘This makes brand advertising significantly more effective at driving brand KPIs, foot traffic and offline sales’.
A survey of 500 marketing managers showed 78% feel very or somewhat confident about how AI can be used specifically in marketing, but only 10% are currently using AI, demonstrating the scale of the opportunity.
LoopMe’s flagship offering, PurchaseLoop, uses artificial intelligence to optimize towards brand metrics like purchase intent, foot traffic or offline sales. Microsoft, Honda, Heineken (Birra Moretti), Airbnb and Disney are among brands to have run PurchaseLoop campaigns, with an average of 100% uplift delivered measured against human optimization.
Artificial Intelligence Investor & Founder of Rocket Fuel Joins Board
In addition to the funding, George John, who has worked with AI during a career spent at NASA, Epiphany, Salesforce, Yahoo and founded artificial intelligence-led marketing platform, Rocket Fuel, has joined the company’s board of directors.
Upstone said “George John is a giant in the AI & advertising industry and we are delighted to welcome him to the board. His experience of growing advertising businesses and developing industry-leading technology is invaluable as LoopMe continues to pursue an ambitious growth strategy worldwide.
“I’ve known Stephen for ten years and he has always impressed me as someone who understands the significance of AI and opportunities to use it to create value for marketers. At LoopMe he has assembled an experienced and nimble technology team with deep expertise in using AI to optimize marketing results, and the proof is in the impressive ROI case studies, the innovation awards for brand campaigns, and the exceptionally high growth in revenues from repeat customers.”