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Advertising - Monday, March 31, 2008

Undertone Networks Gets Strategic Investment

Online ad startup Undertone Networks says it has received a strategic investment from JMI Equity, first outside financial investment. The amount on the deal was not disclosed.

Undertone Networks currently has a network of 350 "top tier sites." Undertone's offerings to advertisers include: IAB ad sizes, rich media, 16+ channels, behavioral targeting, video (pre-roll & in-page), and search engine marketing (SEO & SEM).

Undertone is actually a subsidiary of Intercept Interactive - another online ad agency offering marketing and media strategy, creative development, and media planning and buying.

Undertone and Intercept were founded by (in March 2001) and are run by Mike Cassidy who was a VP of Sales at About.com.

We have heard strong, positive comments about Undertone. Naysers will tell you that advertisers will stop paying top dollar to appear on expensive sites because you can get to the same audience for less by using behavioral technology or through Adwords. But there is and always will be advertisers that don't want to appear just anywhere. Rather they think that by appearing on BusinessWeek.com they get cache and are sure they are hitting the right people.

View - Undertone site
View - Intercept site