Koupon Media, the Dallas company that’s revolutionizing coupons, just closed their $4.5M Series B funding led by local VC firm Trailblazer Capital. Venture Beat broke the story with an exclusive.

The company has now raised more than $6 million to date and continues to grow, having opened offices in Chicago as well.

Read their complete press release below:

Koupon Media, a leader in mobile coupon and offer delivery, announced that they have raised $4.5 million in Series B funding. This latest funding round comes on the heals of Koupon Media’s $2 million Series A which closed in August 2011. The Series B funding was led by Trailblazer Capital of Dallas, Texas, with participation from existing investors DFJ Mercury and The Matthew Pritzker Company. The new round of venture financing will be used to further develop Koupon Media’s technology platform and bring it to market for use with retailers, consumer product brands and marketing agencies. Koupon Media is on track to cause a major shift in the way mobile offers are delivered. Today, most mobile coupon companies require consumers to download their app to receive offers. Koupon Media can deliver offers through a retailer’s app, SMS or the mobile web.

Koupon Media is well-positioned to capitalize on this growth having recently partnered with retail giants such as Michaels Stores. Koupon Media’s uniqueness in the mobile couponing space is its ability to deliver single-use consumer product coupons at retail. These single-use coupons eliminate fraud from the fulfillment process, and are delivered via QR code, bar code, text message, email, or social-media websites. Koupon Media’s fulfillment platform has been integrated with a variety of retailer point-of-sale (POS) systems, providing brands both enhanced product control and detailed analytics to better determine consumer buying behavior.

“We believe that the multi-billion dollar market for product and retailer promotions, coupons, loyalty programs and other brand building marketing is undergoing a massive change,” said Joel Fontenot, Managing Partner of Trailblazer Capital. “Retailers and consumer packaged goods companies are seeking a new alternative to traditional print and broadcast media. This is evident in the growth of online advertising and the boom in new mobile media companies. Fundamental to this changing landscape is the ability of these firms to take advantage of the growth in smart mobile devices, and the ability of these devices in collecting key consumer data.”

“Our platform can manage mobile coupons for any retailer who has a mobile app and wants to deliver fraud-free mobile offers,” said TJ Person, co-founder and CEO of Koupon Media. “The Koupon Media platform is incredibly flexible and can integrate with a retailer’s POS system or even deliver one-time use offers outside of their POS infrastructure. Our goal is to power every mobile offer for retailers and brands.”

Person launched Koupon Media as part of the Tech Wildcatters seed accelerator in Dallas. Previously, Person was President and co-founder of Mango Mobile, a leading mobile content technology platform provider. Person grew Mango Mobile to an early leader in the mobile content market and oversaw its acquisition by Omnicom Group in 2007. In 2009, Mango Mobile was merged with GMR Marketing, a mobile marketing subsidiary of Omnicom, where Person served as Senior Vice President of Mobile Marketing Strategy.

Companies and consumers who are interested in learning more about Koupon Media and its innovative digital coupon platform should visit http://www.KouponMedia.com

About Koupon Media
Koupon Media is an innovative mobile coupon delivery, fulfillment and analytics platform for retailers and consumer product brands. Koupon Media’s single-use coupons eliminate fraud from the fulfillment process, and are delivered via QR code, bar code, text message, email, or social-media websites. Koupon Media’s fulfillment platform has been integrated with a variety of retailer point-of-sale (POS) systems, providing brands both enhanced product control and detailed analytics to better determine consumer buying behavior. The Company was founded in 2011 by mobile technology entrepreneurs T.J. Person and Scott Hutchinson, who have a combined 30 years of experience in the mobile content,

via press release:

According to a Dallas Morning News Article, VC funding decreased by approximately $230 million in North Texas, while venture capital investments rose both nationwide and in Texas during 2010.

Based on comments by John Jaggers of Dallas-based Sevin Rosen Funds, this drop is due to a lack of attractive growth companies of similar scope and potential as Groupon, a Chicago-based company which just raised almost $1 billion and is rumored to be preparing for an IPO sometime later this year or early next year.

Even with this significant decline, North Texas still represented almost 25% of all VC funding in Texas last year.

It seems that DFW firms just aren’t looking to invest in early stage companies, which goes against a national trend that saw increases in Seed and Series A rounds last year. The industries that received the most funding  in DFW were biotech, telecom and health services.

Mobestream Media, the company behind the highly successful mobile app Key Ring, has raised $1.75 million according to an SEC Form D filing uncovered by launchDFW and confirmed by founder Chris Fagan in an interview this morning.

Key Ring is an application that allows you to keep all of your loyalty and rewards cards, that usually take up space in your wallet or keychain, digitally on your mobile device. The app runs on both the iPhone and Android devices currently.

Mobestream was a member of Tech Wildcatters’ first class, where they received $25,000 in seed money and 12 weeks of mentorship before presenting their company in front of a number of angel investors and venture capitalists. Fagan, however, attributes their ability to raise the cash to a pre-existing relationship with the folks at Austin Ventures, the only investor in the round.

“We had initially spoken with Austin Ventures before entering the [Tech Wildcatters] program. We had built up a pretty large user base and they were really interested,” said Fagan.

The company actually ended up raising more money than they had initially anticipated, but will use the extra cash to accelerate hiring and continue their explosive growth. They’ve already made a few key hires, including Bobby Billman who is a former VP of Marketing at Samsung Mobile.

In addition to the hiring spree (check their open positions here) Key Ring will be using the money to quickly expand to other platforms including Windows Phone 7 and Blackberry.

The company has seen phenomenal growth, with well over a million users and corporate partners coming on board in droves. They’ve also introduced coupons and offers within the app and have delivered an astonishing 5 million of those over the past 6 weeks.

For us here at launchDFW, it’s exciting to see more companies being funded in the area. Congratulations to the Key Ring crew!