After Tripling 2019 Sales, Enterprise Results Platform Leader WorkBoard Starts 2020 with $30 Million Series C Round Led by a16z
WorkBoard now the top choice for enterprise results alignment
REDWOOD CITY, California, Jan. 16, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- WorkBoard, the Enterprise Results Management pioneer, announced a $30 million Series C funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz. The round comes as the company tripled sales again in 2019, fueled by both new customers and rapid expansion within its large enterprise customers. Previous investors GGV Capital, M12 (formerly Microsoft Ventures) and Workday Ventures made additional investments in the round as well.
Today, large enterprises are adopting Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) as a vehicle to drive smart, fast growth rather than another employee performance initiative. They turn to WorkBoard's unique results management platform to align, measure and drive growth strategies at both high scale and speed. WorkBoard's enterprise customers include Cisco, Cision, Comcast, Microsoft, Malwarebytes, IBM, Juniper, Workday, Secureworks, Seismic, Reliance Industries, and Zuora – many of whom use WorkBoard enterprise-wide, solidifying its position as the No. 1 choice for enterprise.
"Getting the organization aligned, engaged and executing on the strategy is the most important job of leaders, but in the past, they lacked a systematic, data-driven and transparent way to do it," said Deidre Paknad, CEO and co-founder of WorkBoard. "We started addressing the problem – and its resulting drag on growth – several years ago. Today, savvy leaders know they can't grow fast if they manage slow. The 2010 approach to aligning and driving the 2020 growth plan doesn't work. We are delighted to help some of the fastest growing companies in the world accelerate alignment and results."
With the new investment, WorkBoard will increase its investment in marketing, go-to-market partnerships and in core technology areas like data visualizations and machine learning. Andreessen Horowitz General Partner David Ulevitch will join the WorkBoard board of directors. Ulevitch was previously the founder and CEO of OpenDNS, a cloud-delivered security service that was acquired by Cisco in 2015, and he specializes in enterprise and SaaS companies.
"WorkBoard's focus on enabling CEOs and GMs to activate and drive their business strategy faster distinguishes it from other HR applications designed to measure individual employees," Ulevitch said. "As a former CEO, I see the WorkBoard solution as an essential part of communicating goals, increasing organizational transparency, and ultimately running a company. We are very excited to help WorkBoard expand its category leadership."
Comcast is one of several large enterprises to adopt WorkBoard in 2019. The company deployed WorkBoard in its Technology, Product and Xperience (TPX) organization to advance its market lead and improve agility.
"Using OKRs and WorkBoard has helped us amplify and accelerate results," said Tony Werner, President of Comcast's TPX organization. "The transparency is tremendous — it drives focus and alignment of dependencies for complex projects. I'm delighted with WorkBoard's partnership and platform."
WorkBoard has raised $65 million to date, including $23 million in its Series B funding March 2019 led by GGV Capital. In addition to tripling sales, 2019 was a record growth year for WorkBoard: It increased its engineering and sales team five-fold, its client services team ten-fold and hired its first CFO. The OKR Coach Certification education program it launched late 2018 certified over 1,100 people in 2019. WorkBoard customers drove over 110,000 OKRs and 100,000 meeting decisions on the platform, and the company shipped 11 releases over the year, including new native integrations with Jira and Azure Dev Ops.
In 2019, WorkBoard also created the OKR podcast with guests from Cisco, Microsoft, Zuora and Secureworks. The company also launched BGIN, a community forum of experts to help enterprise stakeholders address the causes of internal growth drag and drive management innovations in accelerating business results. Exclusively for enterprise executives and chiefs of staff, BGIN held three events in Silicon Valley and New York City, where Workday, Malwarebytes, Cision and WorkBoard were guest speakers. BGIN now boasts 344 members and nine publications.
About WorkBoard
WorkBoard is the pioneer of Enterprise Strategy and Results Management solutions and the only OKR offering for both large enterprises and later stage startups. It unlocks growth for its customers by making alignment and accountability easy. WorkBoard's platform enables high-growth and high-scale companies to align on outcomes and cohesively measure results across the organization. Its OKR coaching services and certification program help organizations quickly achieve results velocity. WorkBoard hosts The OKR Podcast, a resource for anyone who wants to understand how OKRs can unlock growth for their businesses. Customers relying on WorkBoard include Comcast Microsoft, Cisco, Workday, Zuora, Cision, Malwarebytes, McKesson and others. Investors include Andreessen Horowitz, GGV Capital, M12 (formerly Microsoft Ventures) and Workday Ventures. For more information, visit www.workboard.com or follow the company on Twitter @WorkboardInc.
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