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Venture Capital News: MobileSpan Raises $2.3M Series A

2013-01-17
SANTA CLARA, CA, MobileSpan secured an oversubscribed $2.3 million series A round of funding to drive future growth. True Ventures led the financing with participation from Greylock, K9 Ventures, Alchemist Accelerator, and several notable Angels.
MobileSpan today announced MobileSpan for BYOD, the next generation remote access platform for personal devices in the enterprise. MobileSpan is the first platform to seamlessly plug into existing corporate systems and extend the reach of enterprise document repositories and web applications to BYO devices. MobileSpan for BYOD addresses both the enterprise and the individual by arming employees with the power of corporate information on their personal devices without the threat of lost or mishandled data or the high cost of managing devices.

The BYOD trend is being driven by both end-users who want to choose what devices they use and where they use them, and IT departments who want to get out of the "asset management" business. In fact, a recent study by Forrester on the consumerization of IT* revealed that 60% of enterprises currently have or are planning BYOD programs for smartphones while more than 40% are looking to BYOD for tablets and laptops.

"The growing BYOD trend has created a huge market for MobileSpan's flagship product, which enables employees to securely access company content anytime, anywhere and on any device," says Puneet Agarwal of True Ventures. "Nils is a proven entrepreneur who has assembled an incredibly exciting team, and we are thrilled to be working with them."

With a feature-rich product and a rapidly growing need in the market, MobileSpan secured an oversubscribed $2.3 million series A round of funding to drive future growth. True Ventures led the financing with participation from Greylock, K9 Ventures, Alchemist Accelerator, and several notable Angels. The company will use the capital to invest in R&D and marketing in 2013.

"Bring-your-own-device is sometimes seen as a threat to enterprise IT. But if done right, BYOD is an opportunity for IT to move away from owning and managing hundreds or thousands of devices, towards providing a service to workers using any device," said Nils Bunger, CEO of MobileSpan. "We are extending existing enterprise systems and practices to personal devices while maintaining full lifecycle data protection."

MobileSpan for BYOD™ will be showcased on Thursday, January 17 during Alchemist Accelerator Demo Day in Mountain View, CA. Alchemist Accelerator is a new accelerator targeted exclusively at startups whose revenue comes from enterprises.

About MobileSpan
MobileSpan was founded in 2011 by deep Windows enterprise experts from Google and Sun. In 2012 MobileSpan was selected as one of the inaugural companies in the Alchemist Accelerator, an accelerator program exclusively for startups whose revenue comes from enterprises, not consumers. MobileSpan is a privately held technology company that provides a drop-in, Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) solution which enables a company's workforce to work from anywhere, on any device, while remaining fully integrated with existing company management systems, and fully compliant with data governance standards. The company has raised $2.3 million to date. You can find more information at www.mobilespan.net.

About True Ventures
Founded in 2005, True Ventures is a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups. With three funds and approximately $600 million in capital under management, True provides seed and Series A funding to the most talented entrepreneurs in today's fastest growing markets. With a mission to make the world a better place for entrepreneurs, True encourages each founder's vision and has built resources to empower the employees, families and communities of its portfolio companies. The firm maintains a strong founder community and offers innovative educational opportunities to its portfolio, helping entrepreneurs achieve higher levels of success and impact. With more than 100 companies funded and multiple companies acquired, the True portfolio has created over 1,900 jobs. To learn more about True Ventures, visit www.trueventures.com.

The Alchemist Accelerator
The Alchemist Accelerator is the premier, venture-backed initiative focused on accelerating the development of seed-stage ventures that monetize from enterprises (not consumers). Backers of the Alchemist Accelerator include Cisco Systems, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Kholsa Ventures, US Venture Partners, and others. Born out of a 3-year entrepreneurship education outreach started in the Harvard Club of San Francisco, the organization reaches 10,000 technical young alums / students of Ivy League caliber universities, and seeds the top 30 enterprise-monetizing startups per year for a six month program focused on customer development, fundraising, and mentorship. Please visit: http://www.alchemistaccelerator.com
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