• by Steve Smith  @popeyesm, September 15, 2011

InMobi, one of the largest mobile ad networks worldwide, will get a war chest for its expansion into newer markets, including the U.S., with a $200 million investment from Internet powerhouse SoftBank.  

This is one of the largest funding rounds for a mobile company we have seen this year. SoftBank will drop the investment in two stages -- $100 million now and $100 million in April 2012. InMobi announced its formal entry into the U.S. market in June 2010.

InMobi intends to use the funds to expand across key markets and achieve even greater scale. The company will also extend its SmartPay mobile payment product, as well as explore additional acquisitions.

CEO and founder Naveen Tewari stated this morning: "This is just the beginning. With a global leader like SoftBank behind us, we are now well-positioned to fully capitalize on the opportunity before us through substantially increased product innovation, deeper market penetration and acquisitions across the mobile ad value chain."

The company claims to have a worldwide scale of 47.3 billion monthly impressions. InMobi is involved in a range of mobile services beyond ad networks, including mobile payment systems and rich media production.

In August, InMobi acquired HTML5 development platform Sprout. The partnership with SoftBank will help the company increase its presence in the Asian markets vis-à-vis SoftBank's presence in those markets.

SoftBank joins top-tier investors Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers and Sherpalo Ventures in backing InMobi.