BROOKLYN, N.Y., Feb. 12, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Radar today announced it raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Accel to unlock the future of location-based digital experiences. This round brings Radar to $30.5 million in total funding to date, including the previous $8 million Series A led by Two Sigma Ventures in April 2019. Vas Natarajan, a partner at Accel, also joins Radar as a board member.
The latest funding will equip Radar with the capital needed to continue scaling its developer-friendly, privacy-first location data infrastructure. Along with its funding, Radar also announced the availability of its open-source SDK version 3 in public beta, as well as a slate of new APIs in private beta including geocoding, search and distance.
Further, the company will open a San Francisco office later this year, while continuing to grow its headcount in New York. Additional investors in the Series B round include Two Sigma Ventures, Heavybit, Prime Set, Bedrock Capital and the cofounders of Flatiron Health.
Changing the Narrative on Location Data
Radar’s growth comes at a critical juncture for the location data industry. The most popular digital applications depend upon location — from ordering a rideshare and searching for nearby restaurants to tagging social media posts. However, adding these features poses enormous engineering and data management challenges, underscored by growing data privacy concerns.
“Location data is extremely complex, and it’s difficult for developers to manage everything on their own. Companies use trusted processors like Stripe and AWS to house and process sensitive data, but historically there have been no great developer-friendly, privacy-conscious solutions for location,” said Nick Patrick, CEO and cofounder of Radar. “We started Radar to give developers the foundational tools they need to build amazing location-aware digital experiences, all while setting a high standard for privacy practices. Unlike others in the space, we will never sell, share or monetize any location data.”
“When used properly, location data can help companies deliver powerful, differentiated experiences to customers,” said Vas Natarajan, Partner at Accel and newly-appointed Radar board member. “We’ve seen huge growth in customers recognizing this. Radar stands apart as a developer platform and API versus others who commingle location data with ad tech. We responsibly build tools to enable unique location-centric experiences that couldn’t otherwise exist.”
Radar’s technology has already attracted an impressive customer roster, which includes Fortune 500 companies and high-growth startups like Burger King, Booking.com, Ibotta and DraftKings across multiple verticals including retail and ecommerce, food and dining, travel and transportation and entertainment and sports.
New Building Blocks to Expand Radar’s Platform
Radar's platform currently has four context types, supporting geofencing, place detection, home/work/traveling detection, and country/state/DMA detection (Geofences, Places, Insights, Regions). Developers can integrate Radar into their applications via mobile SDK, API and server-side integrations, such as Segment, Braze, mParticle and Amplitude.
Today, Radar also launched the public beta of its SDK version 3, which is open-sourced for the first time, includes more flexible tracking options and new data minimization options like time-based tracking and exposes three new APIs now available in private beta:
- Geocoding allows developers to turn any address into latitude and longitude coordinates (and vice versa), as well as detect a country or region based on IP address. The API is easier to use and less restrictive than what’s currently available.
- Search allows developers to search geofences, places and users near a specific location.
- Distance can calculate the travel distance between two locations.
Later this quarter, the company will publicly roll out the new APIs, as well as introduce new server and browser SDKs.
The new tools will broaden Radar’s capabilities to support more industries and digital experiences and make building location-aware applications more flexible, versatile and customizable than ever before.
About Radar
Radar is developer-friendly, privacy-first location data infrastructure powering location-based experiences for enterprises and high-growth startups. With powerful SDKs, APIs, dashboards and integrations, its full-stack toolkit is trusted in a space historically filled with ad tech and data monetization companies. At a time when user privacy has never been more important, Radar is enabling the next generation of location-aware digital experiences. Founded in 2016, Radar is headquartered in Brooklyn and will soon expand Westward with a San Francisco office. The company is backed with $30.5 million in funding.
For press inquiries, please reach out to:
Gavin Skillman, radar@launchsquad.com