Seattle startup Lockerz, which is positioning itself as a unifying platform for the online lives of teens and young adults, has raised $30 million out of a possible $45 million investment round, according to a new SEC filing. The company declined to disclose the investors, pending further fundraising.
That’s a pretty big chunk of change for the Seattle tech scene, and it comes on the heels of last week’s announcement that the company had added Amazon.com veteran Mark Stabingas as chief operating officer. Lockerz is led by founder and chief executive Kathy Savitt, who worked with Stabingas during her previous gig at Amazon. The funding news was first reported by TechCrunch.
Lockerz is trying to establish itself as a destination site for young people by throwing together several key elements: social networking, game mechanics, and shopping discounts. Users—Lockerz says there are about 18 million—earn points by interacting with content and other people on the site. Those points can then be redeemed into actual savings through online purchases. Lockerz also seeks to be a middleman for other social networks, allowing users to send uploaded photos over to their Facebook page after first earning Lockerz points for that action.
Another very interesting element to Lockerz’s plan is the fact that it actually has some original programming—a leap that Netflix and other digital platforms have been making lately, and one that got the startup a nice hefty mention on The New York Times last month. Lockerz also acquired online photo-sharing service Plixi in January. The company says it now has more than 70 employees at offices in Seattle, San Francisco, and San Diego.
As GeekWire points out, the $30 million being reported today is in addition to an earlier $30 million round, making Lockerz a notably well-financed startup in the Seattle area. The company’s previously announced investors included Liberty Media Corporation and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.
