RiseSmart, the leading provider of next-generation outplacement solutions, today announced that it has raised $2 million in venture financing from Norwest Venture Partners (NVP). The disruptive HR services provider has raised a total of $13.85 million since its 2007 founding from NVP, Storm Ventures and angel investors.

"The traditional business model in the billion-dollar U.S. outplacement industry is in decline; RiseSmart has created a model for the present and future," said Venkat Mohan, operating partner at NVP. "It's telling that during a period when RiseSmart has emerged as one of the fastest-growing private companies in Silicon Valley, the industry's largest players have experienced declining revenue growth. This is a big reason why the leadership and clients of competing outplacement providers have been shifting in droves to RiseSmart."

"The rapid decline of traditional outplacement companies is no different from what happened to Blockbuster when Netflix came on the scene, or to brick-and-mortar travel agencies when Travelocity and Expedia emerged," said Sanjay Sathe, RiseSmart founder and CEO. "It is happening again in the offboarding space, and RiseSmart's disruptive innovation is a key reason for this."

RiseSmart's Transition Concierge is the first outplacement solution to harness the full weight of intelligent search technology, social media, and other online tools to help put laid-off employees back to work faster. Powered by proprietary job-matching software, Transition Concierge delivers custom-tailored job leads as well as information, tools and training to eligible employees through personal career-management portals. Laid-off workers have access to one-on-one assistance from trained Transition Specialists during every step of the job-finding process.

Workers in the Transition Concierge program find new employment in an average of 18 weeks, the latest RiseSmart survey data shows. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the seasonally adjusted average duration of unemployment in December was 40.8 weeks.

About RiseSmart

RiseSmart is the leading provider of next-generation outplacement solutions. The company leverages a cloud-based technology platform, proven methodologies, and one-on-one support to help employers with their workforce strategies, and displaced employees with their career strategies. RiseSmart drives significant ROI to organizations by offering affordable pricing while reducing unemployment insurance taxes and severance costs. RiseSmart has received a wide range of awards and recognition from organizations including the Golden Bridge Awards, the Momentum Index, Red Herring, the San Francisco Business Times, SiliconIndia, the Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal, the Stevie Awards and TiE. For more information, visit http://www.risesmart.com.

About Norwest Venture Partners

Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) is a global venture and growth equity investment firm that manages more than $3.7 billion in capital. Headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif., NVP has subsidiaries in Mumbai and Bengaluru, India; Herzelia, Israel; and Hong Kong. NVP makes early to late stage venture and growth equity investments across a wide range of sectors including: information technology, business services, financial services, infrastructure, technology enabled services and consumer. NVP has actively partnered with entrepreneurs to build great businesses for more than 50 years and has funded nearly 500 companies since inception. For more information, please visit www.nvp.com.