Quantcast Funding Will Support New Ad Product

Quantcast won a $27.5 million series C funding round led by Cisco. The money will be used to drive advertiser and publisher adoption of the company’s six-month-old Quantcast Media Program. CEO Konrad Feldman said that will mean hiring new staff and further developing the platform’s underlying technology.

Launched in June, the Media Program lets advertisers apply their own audience data to participating Quantcast publisher audiences and thereby create audience segments. They can then place media buys directly with publishers, or they can go through Quantcast. The product marks the company’s latest move into marketer-side services, after spending its first two years developing its lynchpin audience measurement service for publishers. Other advertiser services include audience planning tools and an integrated TV/online measurement offering created in partnership with TiVo.

Feldman said the company is aggressively courting both publishers and advertisers to use the Quantcast Media Program. He said “hundreds” of publisher partners have so far joined the program, a small fraction of the more than 10 million properties that use its measurement services. “We continue to have a regular stream of major media companies coming onboard with the program,” he said.

Cisco said its investment is part of a business priority focused on targeted online advertising. Dan Scheinman, SVP and GM of Cisco’s Media Solutions Group, said Quantcast’s technology “aligns with the needs of Cisco’s customers, from service providers to media companies and ultimately consumers.”

The round was co-led by existing investor Polaris Venture Partners. Two other previous investors, Founders Fund and Revolution Ventures, also participated.

Update: An earlier version implied Quantcast’s Media Program requires ad buyers to place buys using Quantcast as an intermediary. In fact, they can also transact directly with the publisher.