Freshworks is a San Mateo-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) company. The company has expanded its portfolio through acquisitions, including cloud management platform Flint and customer management platform Natero. In November it raised $150 million in a Series H financing that set a post-financing valuation of $3.5 billion. Investors in Freshworks include Sequoia Capital, CapitalG, Accel and Tiger Global, per VCCEdge and reporting in the article. The company also saw a recent secondary share sale, underscoring ongoing investor interest. Freshworks offers a suite of integrated business software tools spanning CRM, help-desk, marketing, sales and customer success. The company has built an enterprise SaaS platform and recently announced a unified data platform called the “Customer-for-Life Cloud” to bring customer lifecycle data into a common model. CEO and co-founder Girish Mathrubootham said part of the new funding will be invested in R&D to continue building out the platform. Freshworks launched in 2010 and today reports roughly 2,500 employees, 250,000 customers and almost 40,000 paying customers. The company has completed 12 acquisitions to date and says it will continue to look for targets to add talent and technology. Management is hiring a CFO and preparing the company for an eventual IPO when the timing and readiness are right. Freshworks offers a suite of business software tools spanning IT management, CRM for sales, and customer support. The company plans to use new capital to invest in its platform and to explore AI-driven innovations across its products. It reported pulling in over $100 million in annual recurring revenue and its tools are used by about 150,000 businesses. Freshworks also hired Suresh Seshardi, a former AppDynamics VP of finance and treasury, as its CFO. CEO Girish Mathrubootham said the company hasn’t started an IPO process but may eventually pursue a U.S. public listing, while the current focus remains on growth and platform investment. The company launched its first product in 2010. Freshdesk is a provider of cloud customer engagement software that lets organizations support customers via email, phone, websites, forums, and social media. Its product suite includes Freshdesk, Freshservice (cloud IT service management), Hotline.io (in-app support), and Freshsales (CRM for high-velocity sales). The company reports over 80,000 customers worldwide, including 3M, Honda, Bridgestone, Hugo Boss, University of Pennsylvania, Toshiba and Cisco. Freshdesk maintains offices in San Bruno, Berlin, London, Sydney and Chennai. The company plans to use new funding to accelerate product development and expand regional teams across the globe. In April 2016 Freshdesk raised $55M in a Series F led by Sequoia Capital India with participation from Accel Partners. Freshdesk is a cloud-based customer service tool launched in 2010 that handles inquiries across phone, web, email, chat and social channels. The platform helps manage and prioritize customer issues, with filters for agents and priorities and configurable service-level agreements. The company focuses on SMBs and relies on inbound marketing to keep customer-acquisition costs low rather than building a large sales organization. Freshdesk has grown rapidly, doubling customers to 40,000 in the last year (up ten-fold from 4,000 two years earlier) and doubling headcount to about 350 employees. Management says it will likely hire more staff and may build a bigger in-house sales team as it expands, but intends to concentrate future investments on product development and support. The company positions itself against rivals like Zendesk and Salesforce in parts of the market but often competes with companies simply using email for customer support.

Total raised

$399M

Funding rounds

8

Latest round

Series H

Latest activity

Nov 2019