• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, September 4, 2008

Mobile marketing firm Vibes Media has raised $15 million in a first-round venture financing led by Fidelity Ventures. Vibes plans to use the capital to fund acquisitions and develop new marketing programs and technologies.

Founded in 1998, Chicago-based Vibes has handled more than 50,000 mobile campaigns in the U.S. on behalf of clients including Coca-Cola, Texas Instruments, Intel and Dove. More than 22 million people have participated in Vibes campaigns, generating more than 400 million text messages.

Co-founder and CEO Alex Campbell said the company sought venture backing after a decade in business in order to finance its expansion. "We're starting to see a lot of big brands and entertainment companies get involved in mobile marketing," Campbell said. "It's a great time to begin this kind of expansion and raise growth capital in this space."

Vibes is already eyeing potential acquisitions, looking at "business models that are proven that we could use to create a company that's better than the sum of all its parts," Campbell said. While focusing mainly on messaging campaigns to date, Vibes also plans to push into new mobile marketing avenues.

"Now that we have devices out there that are somewhat similar in nature, there's a great opportunity to bring in new types of functionality," he said, alluding to technologies such as location-based services and growing use of the mobile Web.

Worldwide mobile ad spending will grow from $2.7 billion in 2007 to $19.1 billion in 2012, mainly on the strength of text-message campaigns, according to an eMarketer forecast earlier this year. Mobile ad spending in the U.S. is expected to hit $6.5 billion by 2012.

With its long experience in mobile marketing, however, Vibes brings some perspective to the much-hyped category. "We know what works in the mobile environment," Campbell said. "We're not going to take some existing media or advertising and just slap it on a mobile device."

In connection with the investment, Fidelity Ventures partner Dave Power will take a seat on the Vibes board. "As a mobile marketing pioneer, we believe that Vibes Media has the track record and expertise and platform strength to emerge as the category leader," said Power, in a statement.