Israel-based social communication platform Shaker launched in the US today, just two days after raising an undisclosed amount from Motorola Mobility Ventures, the corporate venturing unit for telecommunications corporation Motorola Mobility.
Shaker previously raised $15m in a September 2011 series A round featuring venture capital (VC) firm Crunchfund, VC firm Menlo Ventures, VC funds Pitango Venture Capital and Innovation Endeavors, and angel investor Troy Carter, the business manager for pop star Lady Gaga.
Prior to the series A round, Shaker raised two seed rounds, one worth $1m from Israeli entrepreneur Zaki Rakib in 2010, the other a $2m round coming in March 2011 from Pitango. Shaker also won the Startup Battlefield contest at TechCrunch’s Disrupt San Francisco conference in September.
Shaker operates an online platform that recreates settings analogous to the outside world, such as a bar or a club, as digital environments where Facebook uses can interact with each other in real time. Previously available only to users in Israel, Shaker had planned to launch in the US in the first quarter of this year and has already opened offices in New York and San Francisco in preparation.
Mony Hassid, managing director of Motorola Mobility Ventures, said: "Shaker is the next step in social networking online. Shaker’s innovative platform gives consumers the ability to not only interact with each other, but with brands in groundbreaking ways that could never before have been accomplished on a social network."