Younity, a San Diego media startup developing “personal cloud” technology, said it has raised $8 million in a Series A round of venture funding led by Marker, a New York-based venture capital and growth equity firm.
Tim Draper’s Draper Associates and PROfounders Capital also participated in the round, which brought total funding for the company to $11.25 million over the past three years. The company was founded in Boulder, CO, as Entangled Media, according to CrunchBase. Entangled Media now serves as the holding company that owns and operates Younity, which is based in Encinitas, about 30 miles north of San Diego, according to a Dec. 3 statement.
The startup plans to use the funding to advance its software, enact industry partnerships, and expand the company.
Younity says it is “reinventing the home media center” by developing “personal cloud” technology and a streaming media platform that is intended to enable smartphone and mobile tablet users to access their videos, photos, songs, documents, and other files anywhere, anytime.
The startup says it solves a problem users encounter when they can’t easily use a tablet or smartphone to access media stored on their computer, or vice versa. Younity says its proprietary technology enables users to access all files stored across multiple devices and unifies all documents and media libraries (such as iTunes catalogs and Adobe Lightroom portfolios) via a single secure mobile application.
In a statement released by the company, Draper says, “Younity’s streaming media platform introduces a whole new way to privately access and share personal media.”
With the infusion of new capital, Younity said it will hire new employees in Encinitas and Boulder, and expand the company’s coverage of device platforms to include third-party platforms and online services.
