Phunware Raises $30 Million To Grow 'Software of Things'

Multiscreen as a Service (MaaS) pioneer Phunware announced that it has raised $26.25 million of Series E funding led by Firsthand Technology Value Fund. The Austin, Texas based company has grown dramatically since it started in 2009, with 2013 revenues of $22.1 million. The company currently supports more than 1 trillion annual transactions on its “multiscreen cloud platform” across nearly 190 countries and 10 languages. The initial closing of the round includes additional investment by current investors Fraser McCombs Ventures, Maxima Ventures, Wild Basin Investment and the Central Texas Angel Network, as well as new strategic investors Cisco and WWE. The investment brings the total raised by Phunware to $43M. With the investment, Kevin Landis, Chairman and President of Firsthand, and Chase Fraser, Managing Partner of Fraser McCombs Capital, join Phunware’s board of directors.

“Phunware has proven its ability to support the largest brands in the world on the largest stages in the world at scale,” said Kevin Landis, Chairman and President of Firsthand. “We are extremely excited to be joining the Phunware team and equally enthusiastic about the company’s multiscreen platform vision for the future."

The company is responsible for multiscreen infrastructure, software and application development services for an impressive list of top-tier customers including E! Entertainment Television, NBC Sports, WWE, NASCAR, CBS, Qualcomm, Edmunds, Jawbone, HomeAway, Turner, UHealth, Transamerica, King, Warner Brothers, AT&T and Adobe among many others. Its solutions make it easy for any brand to add multiscreen application support for content management, location based services, advertising, alerts and notifications and business intelligence and analytics through the use of a single login on a single platform with a single partner.

“We continue to have a very ambitious vision for Phunware – to enable our customers to engage, manage and monetize every connected device on Earth,” commented Alan S. Knitowski, Chairman, CEO and Co-Founder of Phunware. “We have achieved tremendous growth since inception and this new funding will further accelerate our MaaS platform investments and geographic reach in supporting the multiscreen goals and objectives of our brands’ anytime anywhere audiences globally.  50 billion devices will mean 50 billion opportunities … and we intend to touch them all.”