Stockholm, October 12, 2021. SaaS scaleup Funnel, the leading Data Platform for Marketing, has closed a Pre-IPO investment of $66 Million USD of primary capital to fund the continued rapid expansion of the business. The investment is led by The Fourth Swedish National Pension Fund (AP4) and Stena Sessan, with participation from existing investors, including Balderton Capital, Eight Roads, F-Prime, Oxx, and Industrifonden. The closing marks the last round of private funding before Funnel’s planned initial public offering (IPO) on Nasdaq Stockholm.
Marketing is now a digital-first industry with 60% of marketing spend having moved online, according to research firm eMarketer1. This is the biggest shift for marketing since David Ogilvy introduced modern advertising some 60 years ago. Digital comes with a promise of measurability, and, for the first time, marketing is accountable for driving revenue. This is an opportunity that raises the stakes when it comes to measuring and optimizing performance. Many marketing organizations are struggling since they mostly rely on manual reporting using spreadsheets.
Funnel is the Data Platform which solves the problem of measurement and performance optimization for marketing organizations and teams. Its pre-built marketing connectors gather the data marketers need, letting them easily analyze performance through leading visualization tools. Thanks to automatic curation and data harmonization, marketers and analysts get real-team insights to make better decisions, with no coding or technical teams required.
Fredrik Skantze, CEO and Co-Founder of Funnel, comments: “The market has matured substantially since Per Made and I founded Funnel. Back in 2014 it was mostly ecommerce and app companies that cared about measuring digital marketing performance. Now, it is top of mind with virtually every marketing organization, something which is evident with our customers and has driven our strong growth. With AP4 and Stena Sessan we are bringing two large public market investors onboard, and we look forward to working with them as we prepare to take the company public.”
Jannis Kitsakis, Senior Portfolio Manager at AP4, comments: “We are long term investors who look for companies we like and hold them for a long time. We were impressed with the size of the global opportunity and the team’s ambition to build a large software company.”
Fredrik Konopik, Investment Director at Stena Sessan, comments: “Funnel has shown strong, predictable growth with impressive go to market metrics and a global footprint. We feel that the company is well positioned for the public market in Sweden.”
Over 1200 of the world’s most innovative digital marketing teams use Funnel’s Data Platform to date, including Home Depot, trivago, Skechers, Samsung, Vodafone, Logitech, Skyscanner, SAS – Scandinavian Airlines, as well as leading media agencies Havas Media, Ogilvy and DAC Group.
ABG Sundal Collier acted as financial advisor, and Vinge as legal counsel to Funnel in the financing process.
Fredrik Skantze talks about Funnel and what this Pre-IPO means for the company. Watch the video below.
About Funnel
Funnel is the Data Platform that gives marketers business-ready data that makes sense. This means data that is clean, accurate, and always up to date. The company’s mission is to help marketers to become more data-driven. Funnel today helps more than 1200 customers to grow their business – including digital leaders like Home Depot, Havas Media, and Samsung.
Funnel makes it easy to report marketing performance. It allows marketers to collect data from all platforms across the customer journey: advertising, analytics, and CRM, transform the data with recommended and customizable rules, explore it to find new insights, and send it to visualization apps or data warehouses. Real-time insights, whenever and wherever marketers need them. Read more on funnel.io.
About The Fourth National Pension Fund (AP4)
AP4’s mission is to contribute to the financial security of current and future pensioners in Sweden by managing part of the national pension system’s buffer capital. AP4’s long-term perspective, responsibility as an owner and strong commitment to sustainability create opportunities for high returns at a low cost. In this way AP4 works for more secure pensions.
About Stena Sessan
The investment company Stena Sessan is part of the Stena Sphere and owned by the Olsson family. Through collaboration with co-owners, management teams and organisations, we help to develop businesses that can address the needs and challenges that the future holds. Our investment strategy is built on flexibility and a long-term investment horizon.