The People Driving People-Based Marketing Platform BounceX
Last week saw the news of BounceX’s successful $37 million Series B financing. The round was led by Battery Ventures, with participation from Primary Venture Partners, Contour Venture Partners, Cross Creek Capital, Jason Finger and Rho Ventures. This is a huge win not only for our portfolio, but it’s great news for NYC Tech, which continues to demonstrate its ability to build bigger and better companies. But perhaps most important is that the round’s lead investor — Battery Ventures — has a hugely impressive track record of backing great MarTech companies, including Omniture (acquired by Adobe), Exact Target (acquired by Salesforce), BlueKai (acquired by Oracle), Marketo (went public and later acquired by Vista Equity) and Neolane (acquired by Adobe), to name just a few. Simply put, Battery’s investment speaks volumes about the important advances BounceX is making in the MarTech world.
MarTech is a notoriously challenging and nuanced industry — constantly in flux with large incumbents, an influx of new innovators, shifting consumer expectations and a foundational layer that never quite seems to settle. For instance, new privacy restrictions and this month’s enforcement of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation call for new approaches to advertising and digital fingerprinting. Given these ever-shifting dynamics, only those marketing platforms that can adapt, sell, prove customer value and build a real competitive moat are able to scale and remain in the game for any meaningful period of time.
BounceX has been one of the few that has broken away from the pack and risen to the top. The people-based marketing cloud identifies anonymous users on your website and deploys integrated services to reduce bounce rates and drive conversion. Needless to say, these are becoming increasingly integral services as rules around privacy and data tracking continue to evolve. BounceX is the first new revenue channel with scale for marketers that has emerged over the last decade. The company has quadrupled its revenue since being named Inc.’s fastest-growing software company in 2016, and its traction in the market can be gauged by its exceptional and loyal customer roster that includes heavyweights like JetBlue, Neiman Marcus, Avis and Hugo Boss, to name just a few. BounceX has lined up a growing pipeline of innovative partnerships that make it even more responsive and adaptable to whatever curveballs the industry throws its way, while an ongoing string of industry accolades position it as a market leader for the foreseeable future.
Given the complexity of the MarTech landscape, it was critical in this Series B round to bring on a seasoned investor with a proven track record of having built really large companies in the space, and with the deep insights to strategically navigate the market. The choice was an obvious one, and we are extremely fortunate to have had Neeraj Agrawal of Battery Ventures lead the round and join BounceX’s board. Neeraj is a fixture of Forbes’ Midas List, having received the honor eight years straight, and he’s had a great run in the SaaS world. His investments include recently acquired Glassdoor (for $1.2 billion), Coupa and Nutanix, both of which went public in 2016, and AppDynamics, which was acquired by Cisco in 2017 for $3.7 billion. A native of Queens, Neeraj is no stranger to New York City. Some of his local investments include Sprinklr, InVision, Braze and StellaService, and he’s committed to being an active member of our community as we continue to spin off larger and larger successes.
Neeraj’s investment in BounceX, and his active role on the company’s board, signal great things ahead for the company. We’re honored to be working closely with Neeraj and the Battery team, and we hope that this is just the first of many collaborations between our firms.
Huge congratulations to Ryan Urban and to the entire BounceX team on reaching this very important milestone. We can’t wait for this next chapter to unfold!
