ClairMail, Inc., the leader in mobile phone-based customer interaction solutions, today announced that it has secured $12 million in Series B financing led by JAFCO Ventures, a venture capital firm specializing in investments for early expansion-stage technology companies. Previous investors Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) and Outlook Ventures also participated in the financing.
Building on momentum from the recent release of its mobile customer interaction system customized for retail banking and its solution for the government-mandated multi-factor authentication requirement, ClairMail will use the new capital to expand sales, marketing and product development efforts for its breakthrough mobile access platform and to strengthen the implementation services and partnerships necessary to provide exceptional value to its clients and their end-user customers.
"We have been following the growing mobile space for a number of years and are confident that ClairMail is uniquely positioned to quickly dominate the mobile customer interaction market. We were very impressed with the value proposition that ClairMail is delivering to financial institutions and how those institutions will immediately benefit from providing mobile services to their customers," said Tom Mawhinney, General Partner, JAFCO Ventures. "ClairMail's innovative technology meets the changing needs of businesses and consumers alike by enabling a new 2-way channel for secure information via text messaging or wireless email. For existing channels like IVR, live agent and online access, the ClairMail system empowers customers to access secure information whenever necessary and allows businesses to enhance customer service and increase business efficiency."
"The investment from JAFCO Ventures along with participation from our previous investors comes at a time when mobile phone proliferation has surpassed even the Internet, and the need for secure, on-demand access to important information is not only desirable, but necessary," said Joseph Salesky, CEO, ClairMail. "We plan to use these additional resources to help meet the dramatic increase in demand for our messaging-powered mobile customer interaction solution among financial institutions. Banks, brokerages and card service companies are quickly realizing that ClairMail's solution of optimizing the mobile phone for 2-way customer interaction uniquely solves both information access and security challenges in a compelling way."
ClairMail recently introduced a messaging-powered mobile customer interaction solution optimized for the retail banking industry. The new offering builds on the company's breakthrough mobile access platform and adds a host of new capabilities to power retail banking services - including fund transfers, actionable alerts, transaction verifications, account information and history and no-hold customer service - in a single, comprehensive system.