Today, Pulse announced that it has closed $6.5 million in a Series A funding round led by AV8 Ventures, bringing the company's total funding to $10.5 million. Pulse will use the funds to scale the social research platform, expand the engineering and content teams, and accelerate product innovation to further equip CIOs with the insights they need to run their businesses effectively. The company is also unveiling Product IQ, a product recommendation engine that generates dynamic reports on major technology markets and product efficacy based on specific organizational needs.

Pulse is a community for CIOs and technology executives looking to make better-informed, data-driven decisions. Since launching in 2017, over 15,000 technology executives have joined the platform and contributed to thousands of surveys and polls. This enables Pulse to gather, analyze and distribute more than one million data insights across timely topics like IT preparations for remote work, security measures such as multi-factor authentication, how to implement AI and machine learning across a business, and more. Pulse's unique approach to knowledge sharing has turned the traditional research model on its head, removing the bias, steep cost, and time lag of established analysts and research companies.

"Pulse offers technology executives access to real data, from real people, in real time to help power their decision making," said Mayank Mehta, CEO and co-founder of Pulse. "By bringing together innovation decision-makers from companies all over the world and incentivizing them to share their knowledge and network on a daily basis, Pulse is powering a new kind of effective and dynamic information hub and we're thrilled to expand our impact with this new funding."

"Data ages quickly especially in the technology world where information flow is vital to success. Pulse's quick, data-driven insights simultaneously disrupt and supplement the $50+ billion IT market research industry which creates a great opportunity for growth," said Baris Aksoy, General Partner at AV8 Ventures. "With an ambitious vision from experienced founders and a strong leadership team up to the task of taking it on, Pulse meets a vital need for enterprises and innovative technology executives pushing forward in digital transformation."

In 2019, the cumulative budget for technology in the U.S. was $1.9 trillion. For CIOs, that budget needs to go towards deploying and integrating new technologies that underpin companies' successes. In the midst of growing complexity and a deluge of vendors, CIOs can often find themselves ill-equipped to make major decisions, leaning solely on personal experience or outdated analyst reports. Pulse offers a community of like-minded, verified executives to provide real-time insights, instead of analysts.

"Pulse takes the best parts of the legacy research companies and professional networking sites and leaves the self-promotion, bias, and overblown cost behind," said Lee Vorthman, CSO at Oracle. "Pulse is the real-time, much-needed update to analyst reports, and serves a vital need for decision-makers looking for the most genuine, valuable, and trusted information, as we lead our companies through digital transformation."

Pulse today also announced Product IQ, a new tool that offers personalized, granular product recommendations based on a company's specific needs. Product IQ is the answer to the static two-by-two model of ranking products that has dominated the industry for the past few decades. By enabling CIOs and tech executives to personalize searches and tailor recommendations based on unique needs, Product IQ can effectively and quickly recommend the product fit for any and all business goals.

About Pulse
Pulse is a social research platform and interactive community that's reimagining innovation decision-making for the rapidly changing business world. Pulse combines the best parts of survey, research, and professional networking to democratize information: providing real data, from real people, in real time. Currently a platform with over 15k highly engaged CIOs and CISOs, Pulse brings business leaders together in an exclusive, verified community to share information and ideas, and collaborate on the next frontiers of innovation. Download the Pulse Q&A app, or learn more at home.pulse.qa.

About AV8 Ventures
AV8 Ventures is an early-stage venture fund investing in category-defining start-ups in machine learning, enterprise technology, healthcare, and mobility. The fund is based in Palo Alto, CA and backed by Allianz Group, one of the world's leading insurers and asset managers.