iSpot, a media measurement company vying to win clients amid recent pushback against rival Nielsen. has led an investment round in TVision,a company that aims to provide second-by-second analysis of how people watch TV.
TVision said Tuesday that it had closed a strategic investment round of $16 million that will help it secure “continued transformation and modernization of accurate, person-level panel measurement.” Other investors included SIG Capital, Accomplice, and Golden Ventures. TVision said its funds raised now totaled more than $58 million.
The activity surfaces asa phalanx of start-ups and underdogs are working to compete more fiercely with Nielsen. That company, which was recently taken private, has been without industry accreditation for its national and local TV ratings for over a year, giving others room to try to make a play to offer alternatives. Nielsen’s ratings remain the bedrock of most deals between TV networks and advertisers, but many of the traditional media companies have started to offer new kinds of measurement pacts using companies including iSpot, VideoAmp and Comscore,
iSpot secured a pact with NBCUniversal to become a measurement technology utilized in that company’s alternate system offered during the industry’s recent upfront sales market. Advertisers and media buyers seem interested in working with some of the new offers, but also remain wary of media companies serving as the arbiter of audience size.
As a part of the investment, iSpot CEO and founder Sean Muller will join the TVision board.
