Anzu has announced the completion of its Series B funding round, through which the company has raised a total $48 million.

This significant rise in overall valuation comes along with a number of new high-profile investors; the round was led by media, sport and entertainment company Emmis Corporation, with other participants including PayPal Ventures, Evolution, Simon Equity Partners, and Bandai Namco Entertainment 021 Fund.

PayPal Ventures managing partner James Loftus said: "As the clear market leader in the nascent space of in-game advertising, Anzu brings highly sophisticated advertising into complex, 3D environments."

As for pre-established investors in Anzu, further financial support has come from Sony Innovation Fund, NBCUniversal, WPP, Bitkraft, Samsung Next, Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment (HBSE) Ventures, Axel Springer and Marquee Ventures.

Intrinsic and independent

This latest funding round will include the conversion of SAFE notes, as well as investors exiting with a valuation increase of 10 times. Another boon of the new funding is that it enables Anzu to remain fully independent.

Anzu intends to use the funds to continue to grow its leadership team and make further progress on its footprint in the US, developing its teams countrywide. The company’s intrinsic in-game ad solutions have tripled Cooking Fever’s ARPDAU.

"We are thrilled to close our Series B funding round and bring some exciting new investors on board," said Anzu co-founder and CEO Itamar Benedy. "We are confident that in-game advertising has the potential to be a multi-billion dollar market, and Anzu is perfectly positioned to take advantage of this huge opportunity."

Emmis Corporation founder, chairman and CEO Jeff Smulyan commented: "In-game advertising is ready to become the next major advertising category as marketers connect their brands with billions of cloud, PC, console, and mobile gamers worldwide. We look forward to partnering with Anzu as it delivers the technology and business system to make in-game advertising a large part of every marketer’s media buying plans."

Anzu and Lumen released a two-year study that investigated attention relating to digital advertising.