Circle With Disney Nabs $10M In For Parental Control Device

Circle Media, the company behind Circle with Disney — a device that helps parents enforce their home’s internet rules and restrictions — has raised $10 million in Series A funding.

According to TechCrunch, the Portland-based startup had previously raised $800,000 in startup capital and $3 million in convertible notes, as well as $1.5 million raised in November 2015.

Circle with Disney allows parents to manage the devices on their home network, including when family members can be online and what content they’re able to access. It also offers ways to reward kids with screen time for doing chores, turn off distracting apps while teens are driving and more.

While Circle has plenty of competition, one factor that makes it unique is its partnership with Disney for use of its brand name and select assets. The device includes access to short-form Disney content, like trailers, video clips, games, social media postings, GIFs, emojis, promos and more. And there is new content added daily.

The $99 device is sold through Amazon, Best Buy, Target, DisneyStore.com and Circle’s website, and it recently landed at 3,700 Walmart stores in the U.S. The company wouldn’t disclose how many devices have been sold so far, but says it plans to use the new funding to continue to develop the product, expand to new markets and pursue growth.

“With our current headcount at about 30 people, we have plans to double that in the next 12 months across all departments, specifically in our development teams,” said Circle Founder Jelani Memory. “We’ll also be continuing to work on new product offerings that will be debuted later this year, as well as scaling into additional regions across the globe. We have current availability in Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden and seek to expand that. We’ll also seek to deepen our marketing spend.”