Chinese Internet search engine Baidu Inc. has made a multi-million U.S. dollar strategic investment in Taboola, an online content discovery platform, according to a company announcement.
NASDAQ-listed Baidu plans to bring Taboola’s "You May Also Like" discovery services to the Chinese market, where mobile is the number one way people go online.
Baidu’s investment follows Taboola’s US$117 million series E round of financing announced in February.
"Though our roots are in China, Baidu actively seeks out innovative technology companies abroad to partner and invest with,” says Peter Fang, senior director of corporate development at Baidu.
Founded in 2007, Taboola’s existing strategic investors include Advance Publications, Comcast Ventures, Groupe Arnault, Yahoo! JAPAN, and others.
Taboola serves more than 200 billion monthly content recommendations to over 550 million users on publisher website around the globe.
Its annual revenue grew from less than US$10 million in 2012 to over US$200 million in 2014, says the statement.
