mCommerce company mobeam has announced that it has closed a $4.9m Series A venture round, haivng received funding from yet2Ventures, Samsung Ventures, and Mitsui – as well as other independent investors.

Funds from this investment will be used to establish mobeams technology – which uses light to allow mobile phones to interact with point-of-sale (POS) technology – as an industry standard, says the company. It will put the finds towards accelerating business development efforts with major consumer and retail brands for mobile couponing and other broad mobile commerce initiatives. 

“Laser scanners are used in all major retail locations throughout the world, yet no current mobile technology can communicate with them, except for mobeam,” says Ben duPont, general partner of yet2Ventures. “Increasingly, mobile phones are the centerpiece of everyones daily lives, but in order to deliver a complete digital commerce experience they must communicate universally with scanners at point of sale. Thats the beauty of mobeam; mobeaming a barcode works accurately and reliably every time, and it makes the technologies retailers already have far more useful while adding a new layer of intelligence gathering for retailers and brands.”

“mobeams technology addresses virtually every POS environment,” says Chris Sellers, CEO of mobeam. “Not only is mobeam the only way to use light to interact with a laser scanner, our technology can also simultaneously display 2D images and initiate NFC transmission, making it possible for retailers, brands and device manufacturers to rethink mobile commerce. mobeam is solving a significant problem for consumers, brands, retailers and every other player along the retail value chain. The potential for mobeams light based communications technology – from mobile couponing to ticketing to mobile content – promises to be a tremendous industry game changer.”