With mobile playing an increasingly important role in the path to purchase, Phunware has acquired Digby to significantly enhance its presence in the retail vertical.

With customers such as Cabela?s, Kohl?s, Catalina Marketing and Hasbro, Digby will help Phunware broaden its reach as it continues to build out a contextually relevant, hyperlocal marketing and targeting platform for mobile. The news follows Phunware raising $26.2 million in funds in late March to support its goals for global expansion.

"Marketers across all industries want to leverage the power of location to increase the timeliness, relevancy and efficacy of their customer engagement," said Alan Knitowski, chairman and CEO of Phunware.

"Digby and Phunware's complementary technologies will provide marketers with the broadest set of tools for managing highly-targeted, seamless mobile engagement, advertising and content delivery across locations ranging from a region or neighborhood, to the front door of a business, all the way down to the few square feet in front of retail store shelf or sporting event kiosk where purchase decisions are made every day," he said.

Next-generation experiences
Phunware?s multiscreen, cloud-based platform helps brands engage, manage and monetize mobile users.

The Digby deal will enable Austin, TX-based Phunware to expand its multiscreen offerings for indoor and outdoor location-based services through complementary geo-location technology.

Specifically, Digby?s Localpoint platform connects digital engagements to the physical world so that retailers can deploy next-generation mobile shopper experiences.

The Localpoint platform will be integrated into Phunware?s Location Based Services module with the goal of enabling brands across all market segments to have contextually relevant, location aware interactions on a one-to-one basis.

Multiscreen marketing
The Digby team is expected to transition to Phunware?s offices over the next several weeks.

For marketers, Phunware focuses on giving brands a way to reach consumers across multiple touch points with a centralized management system and a single login.

The platform currently reaches across 190 countries and 10 languages.

"Location based services will continue to become increasingly important to mobile marketers across all industries," Mr. Knitowski said. "The ability to add richer relevancy to customer engagement in the physical world combined with the scalability and personalization of digital delivery make location a must have for marketers across industries in 2014." 

Final Take
Chantal Tode is associate editor on Mobile Marketer, New York