Bangalore: SMS GupShup, a mobile community platform, has announced it received investment of $11 million from Helion Ventures and Charles River Ventures. The funds will be used for business growth, product development and increased sales and marketing.

Since its launch in April 2007, SMS GupShup has grown with over 12 million unique users, in over 500 thousand communities ranging from finance, entertainment, business, news, education, spiritual and health. The company is seeing increasing adoption from major advertisers for targeted, contextual mobile advertising. Initially launched in India, SMS GupShup will later be available in other geographies.

"At Helion Ventures, we believe that this platform for mobile communities and advertising has immense potential," said Ashish Gupta, Managing Director, Helion Ventures.

"SMSGupShup has assembled a talented team of smart technologists and proven entrepreneurs. We look forward to working with them in building a large, successful business," stated Devdutt Yellurkar, Partner, Charles River Ventures.

"This investment will enable SMSGupShup to innovate faster and deliver great products to consumers, advertisers and enterprises," said Beerud Sheth, President, and Co-founder.
SMS GupShup provides a unique platform to enable contextual advertising to targeted communities to increase brand awareness and engagement. For example, SMS GupShup built communities around DLFIPL and Pepsi � Youngistaan to enable loyal users to deeply engage with the respective brands.