In a doubling-down by existing investors, Pocket, the content-shifting company formerly known as Read It Later, has raised a $5 million series B round led by Foundation Capital, while Baseline Ventures and Google Ventures also participated. This follows a previous funding round of $2.5m, which all three VC firms participated in (along with Founder Collective, and several angel investors) — so effectively this is a follow on round.
The company plans to use the new funds to bring its “save for later” experience to more devices and platforms, expand its team, and improve its services for developers and content partners.
Pocket, which often draws comparisons to Instapaper, lets users ‘save’ content on the web to read or watch on any device, anytime — otherwise referred to as space-shifting and time-shifting, two concepts almost as old as media itself. The company was actually started before Instapaper in 2007 by founder Nate Weiner who bootstrapped and developed the product almost singlehandedly until early 2011.
Meanwhile, in April 2012, the company relaunched as Pocket, reflecting its support for media beyond just text, and targeting of mobile devices. Along with browser-based versions, Pocket has apps for iOS and Android, and is integrated via its API into more than 350 third-party apps and services including Flipboard, Twitter and Zite. As noted earlier, expect more platforms to be supported — perhaps Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8 support could be on the horizon, given Microsoft’s recently unveiled smartphone and tablet plans.
Growth-wise, Pocket claims its nearing 1 million ‘saves’ per-day, making it the number one in its space. These include things as diverse as magazine articles, YouTube videos, recipes and “things to buy”.