Japan’s KDDI To Take Over Mobile Ad Start-up Nobot For 1.5 Billion Yen

The Nikkei a.k.a. Japan Business Daily reports today, KDDI‘s cellphone advertising unit Mediba Inc. is planning to take over Tokyo-based Nobot for 1.5 billion yen (US$19.2 million). Nobot is a tech start-up specializing in providing an ad optimization and exchange platform especially for smartphone apps, and has partnered with mobile ad networks such as Smaato, ZestADZ, Mojiva, Medialets and BuzzCity.

Prior to this fundraising, Nobot succeeded in raising 140 million yen from several VC firms last fall. By acquiring the start-up, KDDI is expected to take second place in smartphone ad distribution in Japan earning three billion impressions a month, following behind Google’s AdMob which holds the top spot.

As we write this Nobot sent us along its press release, in which it mentions a plan to launch an office in Singapore by the end of this year. The company also expects to expand its service to Asian countries including Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia and Vietnam.

Readers may recall our interview with Kiyotaka Kobayashi, the CEO of Nobot Inc., when he visited Singapore a couple of weeks ago. He explained about the company’s mobile advertising network AdMaker, which is currently serving up 2.1 billion monthly impressions.