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Jacked Hits $6.5M Pot For Live Web Sports Service
DOW JONES VENTURE WIRE | Tomio Geron | December 20, 2007
Jacked Inc. has raised $6.5 million in a Series A investment for its Web-based sports service.
The round, which closed in April, was led by Core Capital Partners, which invested $3 million, with participation from Gabriel Venture Partners, which also invested $3 million, and Provenance Ventures, which invested $500,000. Bryan Biniak, Jacked's founder and chief executive, founded Provenance.
The company, founded in June 2006, has a Web-based application that runs during live sports broadcasts. The application provides statistics, news, photos and merchandise in real-time as the game is going on, so that viewers can automatically get relevant information.
For example, when a baseball player hits a home run, stats and photos for that player will automatically appear in the application.
"Our Searchcasting engine is watching and reading, through speech-to-text, to figure out what's going on in the broadcast and publish content related to the content," Biniak said.
The Santa Monica-based company announced a deal Wednesday with NBC Sports to provide its service on the NBCSports.com Web site during its Sunday Night Football broadcasts. Previously, Jacked has provided the service during NBC's Notre Dame college football broadcasts.
Users can choose from 19 widgets such as real-time statistics and scores, in-game photos from Getty Images and the Associated Press, Yahoo Inc.'s Flickr photos, and chat.
The service is also available through Jacked's Web site, where viewers watching NBA, NFL and NCAA football games can use the service. Jacked does not have deals with these leagues, because it is not using their content, but rather related services such as news and photos.
The company's platform allows third-party developers to build applications. One company has built a game that allows users to make predictions about the games they are watching. Another one is a trivia application.
The company's revenues are based on advertising, partnership deals such as the one with NBC, and commerce, such as purchases through Amazon.com.
Tom Wheeler, managing director at Core Capital and Rick Bolander managing director at Gabriel Venture Partners, have joined Jacked's board.