Air2Web Announces $25 Million Financing Led by The Carlyle Group to Extend Global Leadership as Full-Service Mobile Marketing Provider

26/09/2006 - 16:40

Air2Web, the leading provider of mobile messaging and marketing
applications, today announced it has completed a $25 million round of
new financing led by The Carlyle Group with participation from
existing investors including Vantage Point, technology luminary Jay
Chaudhry, and UPS. With these funds, the company plans to strengthen
its leadership position as the world's first full-service mobile
marketing solutions provider, expand its global footprint and continue
to enhance its portfolio of mobile marketing services. Air2Web
provides a unified platform that enables marketers, ad agencies,
broadcasters, enterprises and carriers to create, deploy and manage
mobile marketing campaigns, including advanced multimedia and premium
text messaging, alerts, and mobile content delivery, all with
carrier-grade reliability.

Offering the most robust portfolio of services to companies
bringing their brands mobile, Air2Web is trusted by a number of
notable customers including American Express, Cingular, Citibank,
SpikeTV, The Weather Channel, and UPS. The company boasts live
deployments across the world of mobile solutions including campaign
management, mobile couponing, mobile branding and brand presence,
interactive polling, games, trivia, news alerts and notifications,
secure instant messaging, wireless customer relationship management,
group messaging and global content distribution.

"According to our data, Air2Web is well-positioned as a provider
of full-service, message-based mobile marketing solutions to
marketers, TV studios, advertisers and carriers. Text messaging has
become a mainstream application, as 70.9 million Americans reported
using SMS in July, with 8.9 percent of mobile subscribers reporting
they participated in a TV or radio poll," said Will Hodgman, CEO and
president, M:Metrics. "The company's global footprint will serve
Air2Web well in exploiting the many opportunities in mobile marketing
around the world."

The financing was led by The Carlyle Group, one of the world's
largest private equity firms with more than $44.3 billion under
management and a diverse set of assets in relevant sectors including
telecommunications, media and consumer brands. As part of the
financing, Jay Koh of Carlyle will join Air2Web's Board of Directors.

"The market for mobile marketing products and services is taking
off quickly. We looked extensively for the best platform company to
back in a rapidly growing and maturing market, and selected Air2Web as
the early market leader with a strong management team, carrier proven
technology and a successful track record of executing volume campaigns
for leading global advertisers and brand marketers," said Jay Koh,
Principal of The Carlyle Group.

"Air2Web is well positioned in a rapidly growing market with blue
chip customers, a global presence and scalable technology platform.
This new investment will help us leverage our strengths to consolidate
our position as a leader in the mobile marketing space," said Sanjoy
Malik, President and CEO of Air2Web. "We are pleased to have a top
tier group of investors led by The Carlyle Group in this round. We
feel confident that this, combined with our world-class team,
established success with carriers and global brands, and strong
balance sheet will lead to the rapid expansion of Air2Web's presence
in this explosive industry."

About Air2Web:

http://www.air2web.com.

About The Carlyle Group: