Participated · Equity · Sep 2019

Shape Security provides omnichannel fraud prevention for web, mobile and API interfaces, protecting large enterprises from automated attacks and other online fraud. Its platform detects and blocks up to 2 billion fraudulent or unwanted transactions daily while preserving 200 million legitimate human logins and interactions. The company’s mobile SDK is deployed on more than 200 million iOS and Android devices worldwide, and it protects more than half of online banking in North America. Led by co-founder and CEO Derek Smith, Shape plans to use new capital to scale international operations and accelerate AI development. Financially, the company has raised $51M in this growth funding round at a $1B pre-money valuation and has $183M in total funding to date. Shape Security offers an AI platform that detects and shuts down automated attacks in real time, distinguishing real users from fraudsters even when criminals use manual methods. Its solution eliminates bots, fraud and unwanted automation for more than 20% of consumer brands in the Fortune 500. The platform protects over 100 million legitimate human logins each day. Shape is led by Co-Founder and CEO Derek Smith, with Sumit Agarwal (co-founder & COO), Shuman Ghosemajumder (CTO) and Xinran Wang (Chief Security Scientist) on the leadership team. The company has offices in Mountain View, London and Sydney. It intends to use the new funding to accelerate international expansion. Shape Security, based in Mountain View, CA and led by CEO Derek Smith, develops a platform for protecting web and mobile applications from automated cybercriminal attacks. The platform is covered by 23 U.S. patents and targets threats such as credential stuffing (account takeover), application DDoS, and unauthorized aggregation. Its customers include large financial institutions, retail and travel companies, and government agencies. The company has raised $106 million in total funding to date. Following the Series D, Shape intends to use the funds to expand sales across the U.S. and internationally, primarily in the APAC region. Shape's participation in the Hewlett Packard Pathfinder program includes a strategic sales partnership with HPE to offer the Shape solution to HPE customers worldwide. Shape Security provides technology that protects web and mobile applications from automated attacks and bot-enabled account takeover. Led by CEO Derek Smith and based in Mountain View, California, the company offers the Shape Botwall Service to detect and stop malicious bot traffic. Its technology targets attacks enabled by botnets and other forms of automation, which the article notes now account for more than half of traffic to login pages of major websites. Shape's solution is positioned to bypass protections that many enterprises use today, including WAFs, DDoS and fraud controls, and IDS/IPS. The company will use proceeds to accelerate deployments of the Shape Botwall Service with customers across the globe and to expand into China with support from Beijing-based Northern Light Venture Capital. Following the Series D the company has raised $91M in total. Shape Security offers an enterprise "botwall" product that fights automated malware and bots by altering the code served to clients in real time (an approach it calls "real-time polymorphism"). Today the solution is delivered as on-premises hardware that a client installs, though the company says it may virtualize the product in the cloud in the future. The funding will be used to continue developing the technology and to build out a global salesforce as the company moves from stealth into open marketing. Shape reports early-adopter customers in financial services, healthcare, and retail and says it has been inundated with inquiries worldwide since launch. The team includes co-founders Sumit Agarwal, Derek Smith (CEO) and Justin Call (CTO), and senior staff such as Shuman Ghosemajumder, formerly Google’s "Click Fraud Czar." Financially, the company has raised a total of $66 million to date following the latest round.

Participated · Equity · Jan 2017

Reputation is the creator of the Reputation Experience Management (RXM) category and offers an interaction-to-action platform that translates solicited and unsolicited feedback into prescriptive insights. Its technology aggregates public and private feedback data and uses patented algorithms behind Reputation Score X to provide an index of brand performance. Thousands of global customers, including GM, Greystar, Kaiser Permanente, Sutter Health and AutoNation, use the platform, and the company integrates with over 250 partners such as Google, Facebook, Salesforce and Amazon. Reputation has surpassed $100 million in annual recurring revenue, a key SaaS milestone. The company plans to use the new capital to drive product innovation, expand its customer and partnership ecosystem, and fuel international expansion, which is already growing at more than 80% year-over-year. Reputation.com provides an enterprise platform that aggregates public and third-party data (including social sentiment and reviews) and applies algorithms to produce a Reputation Score and actionable insights for brands. The company serves major verticals including automotive (three of the top five OEMs and over 10,000 U.S. dealerships), healthcare (250 customers, including three of the top five), and property management (more than 100 companies), as well as financial services, hospitality and retail. It pivoted from a consumer-focused business (founded in 2006 as ReputationDefender by Michael Fertik) to concentrate on enterprise clients and sold the consumer arm to a private-equity firm. The platform integrates closely with Google as a data and optimization partner and uses unstructured data sources beyond traditional NPS surveys. Future plans described by management include expanding the tech stack to source more primary feedback (customer surveys and feedback forms) and to support further global expansion, while addressing privacy and personal-data handling implications. The company’s growth and expanded product scope have driven a notable increase in valuation in the latest round. Reputation.com provides a SaaS online reputation management platform that aggregates feedback from review sites, social media and mobile surveys into an enterprise dashboard. The platform enables enterprises to respond to consumer feedback from a single interface, speed issue resolution and improve customer and patient satisfaction. It has managed tens of millions of consumer reviews and interactions across hundreds of thousands of online points of presence spanning 77 industry verticals, including healthcare, retail, automotive and restaurants. The company holds over 20 awarded patents for its technology. Features include syndicating reviews and survey results to practitioner and location web pages, mining online conversations for trends, spotting operational improvement areas and triggering corrective actions. Shrey Bhatia serves as President and CEO. Reputation.com delivers technology solutions that help individuals monitor and control what the web says about them. Its products address social networks, social media, online search, data brokers and people-search databases. The company was founded in 2006 and is led by founder and CEO Michael Fertik. Reputation.com serves customers in more than 100 countries and maintains an office in Germany. It closed a $41M Series D financing and plans to use the capital to increase operations and expand the scope of its solutions.

Participated · Equity · Dec 2016

Dynamic Signal provides an employee communication and engagement platform that helps enterprises inform, engage and measure employee audiences across channels and devices. The company plans to use new capital to expand in EMEA and support global customer growth. Dynamic Signal already serves roughly 20% of the Fortune 100 and is available to nearly four million employees across six continents in 100 countries. The business has reported more than 60% year‑over‑year sales growth, 100% year‑over‑year headcount growth, and consistent 3x year‑over‑year growth in EMEA. Customers cited in the articles include Volvo Group, Sage, Oracle, Sky, O2, JPMorgan Chase, Procter & Gamble, Intel and Humana. The company has also achieved EU‑U.S. and Swiss‑U.S. Privacy Shield self‑certification. Dynamic Signal offers a platform that streamlines and measures all types of employee communication and content, including native content and integrations with systems of record and collaboration tools. The platform supports integrations with HRIS, CRM, SSO/Identity Management, intranet providers and social/collaboration tools such as Facebook, Slack and Yammer. The company has introduced DySi Open, personalized newsletters, surveys (including Employee NPS and pulse surveys) and native video broadcasting to expand customer capabilities. Led by CEO and co-founder Russ Fradin, Dynamic Signal intends to use the new financing to expand the platform’s capabilities and hire new people. The company is based in San Bruno, CA and also has offices in Seattle, Chicago, London, New York and Silicon Valley. Prior to this round the company had raised $88.0M in total funding. Dynamic Signal provides an enterprise-grade communications platform that lets companies inform, engage, and empower employees with timely, relevant content across channels and devices. The platform integrates with tools like Facebook Messenger, Slack and Yammer to meet employees where they already work. Hundreds of large global enterprises use the service, including 85 of the Fortune 500, across 21 countries and 19 languages. The company says its product improves employee productivity, engagement, and advocacy. Dynamic Signal will use new funding to expand international operations and increase investment in engineering, sales, marketing, and customer success to serve its growing enterprise customer base. Founded in 2010 and based in Silicon Valley (San Bruno, Calif.), the company has attracted a broad set of strategic and financial backers. Dynamic Signal provides VoiceStorm, a people-powered marketing platform that lets brands partner with and leverage the social reach of employees, fans and customers. VoiceStorm includes reporting, analytics and ROI dashboards to enable marketers to track and measure employee and customer advocacy programs. Customers span entertainment & media, consumer packaged goods, financial services, fashion & beauty, and high tech, including Hitachi Data Systems, Salesforce, Deloitte, IBM and Gamestop. Founded in 2010 and based in San Bruno, California, the company plans to use new capital to accelerate growth and to acquire PaperShare. Dynamic Signal closed a $12M Series C and has raised over $33M to date. The acquisition of PaperShare is intended to combine content marketing efforts directly with lead generation and sales. Dynamic Signal provides an enterprise Brand Amplification Platform that functions as social CRM to identify high-value fans, bloggers, and influencers, recruit them, and build one-to-one relationships across social channels. The platform supports content marketing and consumer engagement programs and has attracted clients across entertainment, financial services, consumer packaged goods, fashion/beauty, healthcare, automotive, advocacy, and high tech. Clients using the platform have reported an 8x increase in brand engagement, a 20x increase in sharing and amplification, and a 400x increase in social media brand impressions. Founded in 2010 and based in San Bruno, California, Dynamic Signal is delivered as enterprise marketing SaaS. The company plans to use the new funds to strengthen sales and marketing, continue investing in engineering, and grow its client support organization to service an expanding client base. Its customer roster includes top companies across multiple verticals and the company emphasizes tools and data that help marketers measure social ROI.

Participated · Equity · Feb 2014

SpinMedia operates a network of pop-culture and music digital brands through two divisions, SpinMedia Music and SpinMedia Entertainment. The company produces roughly 1,000 pieces of original content every day and manages 46 editorial communities. It reaches about 40 million millennials and is described as a top 40 publisher. Headquartered in Hollywood, CA, the business is organized as SpinMedia LLC. The company recently raised $10 million, reflecting its current financing activity.

Participated · Series C · Dec 2013

Sojern provides digital marketing solutions and real-time audiences for the travel industry, specializing in traveler path-to-purchase data. Its platform drives bookings through programmatic display, video, social, mobile and native advertising tailored to travel audiences. The company has made its real-time audiences available to top clients via a programmatic in-house offering and acquired Facebook and Instagram Marketing Partner Adphorus in late 2017. Sojern has tested connected TV and has closely followed trends in travel marketing. The company reports it has delivered $13 billion in bookings for clients to date and serves 93 percent of the world’s Fortune 500 travel companies along with thousands of independent hotel properties and local tourism providers. Sojern is led by CEO Mark Rabe and is headquartered in San Francisco with 13 global locations. Sojern is a traveler engagement platform led by CEO Mark Rabe that leverages machine-learning technology, enhanced programmatic buying (real-time bidding), and data-derived insights. The company provides marketing, distribution, monetization and insight solutions at scale for travel brands. Customers include American Airlines, American Express, Avis|Budget Group, Choice, Enterprise, Hertz, Hilton, Hyatt, IHG, Las Vegas Tourism, Marriott, Microsoft, Samsonite, Starwood, United and US Airways. Headquartered in San Francisco, Sojern opened its EMEA headquarters in London in Q1 2013 and also has offices in New York and Omaha. The company raised $10M in a Series C and plans to use the funds to recruit commercial, engineering and data science people to continue to innovate and scale its platform. Management intends to develop intelligent targeting solutions using the expanded team and capital. Sojern builds targeted advertising products for the travel industry, originally selling ads on boarding passes and now offering the Sojern Media Platform, an audience re‑targeting service for travel. The Media Platform relies on about 50 million pieces of anonymized travel data, algorithms and other technology and reaches hundreds of publishers to serve targeted ads during trip planning and while travelers are on a trip. The platform was introduced late last year and is the company's fastest‑growing line of business. Sojern does not break out revenues, but CEO Mark Rabe says the company booked more revenue in the first three months of this year than it did for all of 2011. The company has strategic partnerships with several airlines and travel companies—some holding undisclosed equity stakes—including Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, US Airways, Hawaiian Airlines, Carlson Wagonlit, Kayak and Travelport. The recently announced funding will be used primarily to grow the company’s U.S. business. International expansion is planned but seen as more challenging due to a fragmented market of smaller, regional carriers. Sojern is an Omaha, Neb.-based vertical travel advertising network offering cross-channel marketing solutions to advertisers. The company leverages online check-in and print-at-home functionality to enable travel partners to deliver additional value to passengers while allowing advertisers to target specific audience segments. Sojern serves display impressions on boarding passes, itineraries and other travel-related properties through partnerships with Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Hawaiian Airlines, US Airways, United Airlines and Travelport. In August 2010 it secured $9M in venture capital funding. The new capital will be used to expand Sojern’s product offerings and provide enhanced solutions for its travel and advertising industry partners and customers. Founder and CEO Gordon Whitten said the funding will help the company meet the continually changing needs of the travel and advertising industries and diverse consumer needs.