With the cash infusion from the private equity firm Francisco Partners of $100 million, Specific Media is looking beyond its display ad strengths to add new ways of advertising to its strategy through acquisitions. According to comScore, Specific Media is the third-ranked ad network in the U.S.
Some of the types of companies they'll be looking for are those with text and in-video abilities.
Specific Media CEO Tim Vanderhook said, "The ultimate goal is to be the largest independent ad network." He added that they're going for "scale and offering multiple ad formats as well. Once we do that, we believe we can be truly 
competitive to big portals themselves. If there's going to be a company that overtakes Advertising.com, we definitely have our sights set on it." (Advertising.com is the Number 1 network.)
Vanderhook also said that there will definitely be a need for more cash in the future, but before they look there, they want to make one or two acquisitions. He added the company will probably look at a public offering also, probable in late 2008 or 2009.
Specific Media, as mentioned focuses primarily on display advertising at this time, and is looking to compete with their two major competitors before they get too far ahead of them.
Some of the targeting methods they've used through their display ads have been contextual, demographic, behavioral and geographic.
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