Trampoline Systems builds social analytics tools for companies. It launched operations in the UK and the US a couple of years ago. The company recently turned to crowdfunding as a follow-on funding route, raising £330,000 from tens of high-net-worth individuals around the world. CEO Charles Armstrong has argued tech startups can operate outside traditional venture norms and the company had previously been after a full £1m round. Today it announced a more traditional angel round from 10 leading figures in the software and financial industries and added members to its board. Terms of the angel round were undisclosed. Trampoline Systems specializes in "social analytics" for companies. The company launched in the UK and the US last year. After an initial $5 million round in 2007 from Tudor Investments, Trampoline sought a new $8 million round but was unable to secure traditional VC funding as the market worsened. With Tudor hit badly by the crunch, the firm pivoted to crowdfunding using a legally vetted website to pull in investors. Two weeks after launching the crowdfunding initiative they closed a $543,000 round. The reported near-term plan centers on using crowdfunding as an alternative to conventional VC financing. Trampoline Systems develops Sonar Dashboard and Sonar Server, tools that auto-track employee activity (including email) and generate an enterprise social network. Sonar Server analyzes social graphs, information flows and hidden expertise so users can find who in the company can help them across departments and geographies. Sonar Dashboard provides a searchable, visual map of a user’s social graph and a news feed of colleagues’ activity, with controls that let users choose what to share and automatic filtering of blatantly personal material. The company demonstrated the product at Web 2 Expo and the article highlights the visualization tools as a distinctive feature. The piece notes that Trampoline raised $6.8 million from Tudor Private Equity.

Total raised

$8M

Funding rounds

3

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Dec 2010