Forty–five member Angel-led syndicate raises $2.8M for Boston’s ViralGains

ViralGains, a company with a mission to create authentic relationships between consumers and advertisers through online video, today announced that the company has raised $2.8 million of a $3.3 million round of funding.

The round was led by Hub Angels, with participation from 45 investors, including 500 Startups’ Dave McClure ($400K), Chicago-based Pallasite Ventures, Christopher Bissonnette ($100K), Boston’s Launch Capital, 500 Startups, and local Boston-based angels Ty Danco, Joe Caruso, Jay Batson ($10K), Ralph Wagner (Walnut), Ben Littauer (Hub),  and Semyon Dukach (Techstars). Other angels include Sheryl Schultz, Will Herman, Mark Carthy, Sergey Gribov, Ed Belove, Michael Mark, and Christine Tsai. In addition, rapper Nasir “Nas” Jones ($25K) joined the investment group.

ViralGains offers a video ad platform, named Praxis, that helps advertisers find targeted audiences for YouTube video content. High profile clients of ViralGains include Exxon, Nestlé, Showtime, Lexus, and State Farm.

ViralGains has worked with 15 Fortune 500 brands to date, as well as numerous advertising agencies, SMBs, and YouTube stars. ViralGains’ inventory includes native and mobile video units placed within premium websites, influencers, social games, and social networks. The ViralGains Praxis targets by 4,000 human attributes while using a recommendation engine to find viewers who are most interested in watching the advertiser’s video.

“This round is going to allow ViralGains to scale up our advertising technology platform to bring on more advertisers who can buy video ad placements from us, and more publishers who can create revenue from those ad placements.” said ViralGains CEO Jay Singh. “Viral video is having a broad positive impact on the global culture and ViralGains is making it easy for advertisers of all sizes to drive views, shares, and conversations to their video." The company is using the funds to move into new markets, including Southern California, New York City and Chicago, and to grow the demand and supply sides of its business.

Asked how they assembled such a large investment group, Hub Angels David Verrill credits the power of syndication and "a CEO who has worked his ass off  presenting the company to potential investors."

ABOUT VIRALGAINS

ViralGains is building the first global exchange for viral video. Since 2012, ViralGains has been on a mission to create authentic relationships between advertisers and customers through online video. ViralGains works with ad agencies, brands, and YouTube stars to get their videos watched and shared by the right audiences. Praxis, ViralGains’ video ad platform, integrates targeting by thousands of human attributes, ad placements on native and social environments, and real time reporting capability to generate positive returns on marketing investment. ViralGains is headquarted in Boston, MA and is actively expanding to New York, Chicago, and Southern California. More information is available at www.ViralGains.com

Jay Singh, the founder and CEO of ViralGains, had previously, at the age of 19, founded ViralMS, with Dan Levin. Before committing to ViralGains full time, Jay went to work at Experience.com as the Demand Development Manager in order to gain valuable experience to make ViralGains a success. It was here that he met Kate Willet who would eventually join ViralGains as the VP of Business Development. After a year, Jay returned to ViralGains and brought Kate along with him. They secured office space at the Cambridge Innovation Center, giving them the structure to turn their idea into a valid business.

  Subscribe to the Angel Investing News