GuideSpark, the leader in employee communications and engagement, announced today that it has closed a $22.2 million round of Series C funding, led by Meritech Capital Partners with participation by existing investors New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Storm Ventures and IDG Ventures.
Since its founding in 2008, GuideSpark has sought to change the way companies communicate with their employees through customized, engaging and cost-effective videos. Available on any device, the GuideSpark platform helps companies to educate employees on a range of complex topics, such as benefits, health care reform and compensation programs. As a result, employers can provide an interactive user experience that resonates with their teams and leads to an engaged and informed workforce.
With the new round of investment, GuideSpark can continue its mission to revolutionize employee communications, better serve its growing customer base and further build its market-leading brand. The funding will support growth across the company, including marketing, sales, product development, content, CSM, infrastructure, corporate and business development, enabling GuideSpark to maintain its status at the forefront of the employee communications field.
GuideSpark will also benefit from welcoming Craig Sherman, managing director of Meritech Capital Partners, to its board of directors. Sherman leverages a wealth of operating experience, having served as COO of Ancestry.com and as CEO of Gaia Interactive. With a history of investing in successful digital media companies and promising startups, Sherman's expertise will complement the existing board and bring great value to GuideSpark as the company continues to scale its business.
'Meritech Capital invests in late-stage tech companies that show true innovation and have proven their ability to disrupt the status quo,' said Sherman. 'GuideSpark has certainly changed the game and delivers a proven solution for more effective employee communications. We are proud to provide GuideSpark with capital to support its rapid growth and continue creating new innovations.'
'Meritech's investment continues to validate the tremendous market opportunity GuideSpark has to transform how companies engage and connect with employees,' said Keith Kitani, CEO of GuideSpark. 'We are proud to be working with some of the country's premier technology investors; their support is instrumental in taking our company to the next level as we continue to transform employee communications.'
About Meritech Capital Partners
Meritech Capital Partners is a leading provider of late-stage venture capital to category-defining private technology companies, and has been one of the top performing venture firms of the past decade. With over $3 billion under management, Meritech primarily leads investments into companies with proven and differentiated technology, rapidly-growing revenue and experienced management teams. With one of the most active venture portfolios in Silicon Valley, Meritech has experience in, and provides guidance on issues facing rapidly growing companies including management incentive plans, IPO market timing and positioning, M&A strategies and negotiations and adviser selection. Meritech investments in industry-leading companies include Box, Facebook, NetSuite, Salesforce, Tableau and Zulily. Meritech is located in Palo Alto, CA and can be found at www.meritechcapital.com.
About New Enterprise Associates
New Enterprise Associates, Inc. (NEA) is a global venture capital firm focused on helping entrepreneurs build transformational businesses across multiple stages, sectors and geographies. With approximately $13 billion in committed capital, NEA invests in technology and healthcare companies at all stages in a company's lifecycle, from seed stage through IPO. The firm's long track record of successful investing includes more than 195 portfolio company IPOs and more than 320 acquisitions. For additional information, visit www.nea.com.
About Storm Ventures
Storm Ventures is a venture capital firm focused on investing in seed and early stage companies in the Mobile Internet, Enterprise Cloud, and Internet-enabled Commerce sectors. Storm was founded by a seasoned group of industry veterans with the common vision of sharing our collective experience, passion and energy to help talented and driven entrepreneurs build great companies of enduring value. Storm has invested in over 100 companies including Airespace (Cisco), Appcelerator, BookRenter, Com2uS (Korea IPO), EchoSign (Adobe), IML (Taiwan IPO), Kidaro (Microsoft), Lightera (Ciena), Marketo, MobileIron, NetScaler (Citrix), SandForce (LSI), Sanera (McData/Brocade), and Sierra Monolithics (Semtech). For more information, visit www.stormventures.com.
About IDG Ventures
IDG Ventures USA is an independent boutique venture capital firm, based in San Francisco. IDG Ventures invests in early stage consumer and enterprise IT companies. Through a strategic relationship with IDG, the world's largest IT media company, IDG Ventures' portfolio companies get free access to significant sales and marketing resources. The firm is part of a global network of technology venture funds with approximately $3.7 billion under management and over 200 active portfolio companies in Asia and North America. Leading technology companies that IDG has backed include BabyCenter, Epiphany, Excite, F5 Networks, Funzio, Infoseek, Minted, Netscape, and Spinner.com in the US and Baidu, Ctrip, Focus Media, SouFun, Tencent, Tudou, Vancl and Vinagames in Asia.
About GuideSpark
GuideSpark, the leader in employee communications and engagement, transforms how organizations communicate and engage with their employees through customized video and mobile experiences for every stage of the employee life cycle, from onboarding to benefits, compensation and more. The solution is accessible via a robust platform that provides an interactive user experience and deep analytics on employee engagement. GuideSpark, named to the Inc. 5000 list of 'America's fastest-growing companies,' serves hundreds of enterprise customers across all industries and millions of employees. By leveraging content and technology, GuideSpark helps its customers transform their employee communications to increase engagement, create efficiencies by saving time and money, deliver consistent messaging and get peace of mind knowing that their employees understand the value of working for the company.