Insider, a leader in personalised, cross-channel customer experiences, has announced a $121 million Series D round led by QIA, at a $1.22 billion valuation. Other investors participating in the round include Sequoia, Riverwood Capital, 212, Wamda Capital, Esas Private Equity, and Endeavor Catalyst.
Early predictions indicate that in the Australian market, Insider will invest $70 million over the next three years. The additional capital will be used to fuel rapid expansion, enhance the company’s core technology and scale local sales and marketing investments. Insider has aggressive global hiring plans and anticipates creating more than 100 jobs over the next three years, with an emphasis on hiring female engineers to fill R&D and product development positions.
Southeast Asia has been a key market for Singapore-headquartered Insider since its establishment. The company first expanded into 11 regions in Asia including Sydney, Korea, Hong Kong, Japan, Taiwan and Vietnam prior to Europe, Latin America and the US. The SaaS company serves some of the biggest brands in APAC including Accent Group, Samsung, MySale Group, HP and more.
“Insider has moved from strength to strength and Australia has always been a priority for the global business”, says Tunc Bolluk, Managing Director at Insider ANZ. “The team and I look forward to the opportunities this new round of funding brings, as we continue to help grow the top brands in Australia.”
With this funding milestone, the company also became one of a few female-led SaaS unicorns in the world. Insider has achieved consistent, rapid growth and according to Crunchbase is one of the top nine B2B SaaS unicorns globally: the fifth largest B2B SaaS unicorn in the US, fourth in Europe, second in Asia, and first in Latin America.
“We’ve been blitzscaling remarkably in the past three years and achieved 3x growth. In the same period, our global team grew by 300 per cent, and our customer base continues to increase,” said founder and CEO Hande Cilingir. “Following our aggressive expansion in Asia, Europe and Latin America, we’ll carry this momentum in the US market. We are a trusted software partner to leading global brands like Samsung, Gap, Mac, and Santander. We are laser-focused on bringing Insider to additional markets, and becoming the number one choice for every marketer on this planet.”
Insider’s platform is used by marketing teams at more than 1000+ global enterprise brands, including industry powerhouses such as Samsung, Gap, Santander, Vodafone, Ikea, Mac, Virgin, Toyota, Singapore Airlines, Madeira Maderia, Marks & Spencer, BBVA, and Estée Lauder. With teams on the ground in 28 countries, Insider ensures deep localisation and support for clients.
Founded in 2012 by Cilingir (CEO), Serhat Soyuerel (Chief Revenue Officer), Arda Koterin (Chief Customer Officer), Sinan Toktay (CTO), Okan Yedibela (VP of Engineering), and Muharrem Derinkök (Chief Product Officer), the Insider team has more than 700 team members from 41 different nationalities across 28 countries worldwide. Insider is a female-led organisation with 60 per cent of top executives in the company, including the CEO, CMO, CFO, and CHRO, being women.
Hande Cilingir was selected as one of the top women CEOs outside of the US by Crunchbase. The market-leading martech platform is trusted by one-third of the Fortune Global 500 and half of Dow Jones Global Titans 50. Insider was named Leader in The Forrester Wave for Cross-Channel Campaign Management 2021 and Gartner Magic Quadrant for Personalization Engines 2021. The company has been named #1 Leader on G2’s Mobile Marketing Software and Personalization Grids with a 4.6/5 rating for 20 consecutive quarters.
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