Callaway Digital Arts, a New York-based publisher of iPad apps, has raised $6m in Series A financing.
The round was leed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers’ iFund, with participation from Ram Shriram, founder of Sherpalo Ventures and a founding board member of Google, Inc., and Mark Pincus, founder and CEO of Zynga.
Callaway Digital Arts is an interactive publisher, which spun out from multimedia publisher Callaway Arts & Entertainment earlier this year to take advantage of the iPad’s innovative capabilities as a publishing platform.
The company, which operates an in-house production studio where storytellers, digital artists, and interactive designers works together, has already published successful applications based on the Miss Spider series of children’s books, including Miss Spider’s Tea Party (for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch) and Miss Spider’s Bedtime Story (for the iPad).
CDA is now partnering with Martha Stewart to launch Martha Stewart Makes Cookies, an app that includes instructional videos, baking tips, packaging ideas, kitchen timers, shopping lists, sharing options, and an array of search features for cookie lovers.
Commenting on the funding, Callaway Digital Arts Chairman and CCO Nicholas Callaway, said that the partnership with KPCB “will further our mission of uniting the world of deep, immersive, and high-caliber content with the revolutionary technology coming out of Silicon Valley”.
The company is building out studios in New York and San Francisco simultaneously. According to Callaway, the company has a three-part content strategy: “forging partnerships with great publishers and brands like Martha Stewart, nurturing the storytellers of the future, and expanding our portfolio of intellectual property”.
FinSMEs
01/11/2010