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October 18, 2012

textPlus Receives $18M in Funding

By Rory Lidstone, TMCnet Contributing Writer

Provider of free mobile worldwide communications, textPlus recently raised $18 million in capital led by the Raine Group, a global merchant bank focused exclusively on entertainment, digital media and sports. Others who joined in on this fourth funding round include previous investors Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, Matrix Partners and GRP Partners.



TextPlus plans to put the money toward international expansion, product development and strategic acquisitions.

Since its launch in 2009, textPlus has aimed to provide a better phone experience by offering superior choice, savings and reliability. Indeed, the company has connected 110 million people worldwide via its open network, provided full phone functionality of data networks of all kinds, delivered savings of $1,000 a year on average per user and facilitated over 50 billion text messages.

Users on average spend more than an hour per day in the textPlus app, while the company monetizes this traffic via display advertising from a number of world-class partners, as well as by user-earned or purchased minutes.

"The tremendous growth and success of our business in just the US and Canada tells us we're well on our way to realizing our goal of becoming the world's leading mobile communication destination," said Scott Lahman, founder and CEO at textPlus. "With The Raine Group on board, we add substantial experience in the telecom, media and entertainment space to our already seasoned team which will help us expand textPlus internationally while continuing to deliver cost-effective, world-class communication services to our customers."

Along with announcing this funding, texPlus has also changed its product and company name, dropping GOGII as the parent company name. The company also acquired Los Angeles-based start-up Jarvus, an app that helps capture and share experiences and events.

Jarvus CEO Chris Vaughan and CTO Raymond Jia are to join the textPlus team.

Earlier in the year, textPlus selected Level 3 Communications to help expand the company's business.




Edited by Braden Becker
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