Deputy raises US$80m from VC in a series B round

Workscheduling startup, Deputy has just raised over $100m in series B funding after having raised $25m in 2017. They plan to use the money to further their R and D efforts and expand their offices in Sydney and Atlanta.

Venture Capital

IVP led the round with support from OpenView Venture Partners, Square Peg Capital and Equity Venture Partners. 

Ahik credits that growth to support from VCs. He shares the following with  Kate Clarke of TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2018/11/28/australian-scheduling-software-company-deputy-brings-in-81m-amid-rapid-growth/

“It’s not about the money but more about the expertise that we have been able to bring in,” he said. “OpenView, for example, has been really, really instrumental for the next stage of our journey.”

What Deputy Does

Deputy’s employee management workflow tool makes scheduling, time sheets, tasks and workplace communication easier for hourly and shift workers.

There software is a brilliant tool for the gig economy - helping contractors, casuals or shift workers manage their time, rostering and other critical workplace operations. It also integrates with many point-of-sale, payroll and accounting systems.

CEO, Ashik Ahmed shared with the press that 10 year old Deputy has grown exponentially every month as much as it did in [the first] six years. It now  has 90,000 customers in 80 countries, including Amazon, Google, McDonald’s, Compass and Uber. It’s scheduled some 200 million shifts, or 1.2 billion hours of work, and facilitated more than $30 billion in payroll payments.

Ashik on the Gig Economy and how Deputy solves a major Pain 

Around the globe, most workers earn money on an hourly basis. In the U.S., according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ data from 2015, roughly 80 million workers were hourly, or about 60 percent of all wage and salary workers in the country.

“The world of work is changing,” he said. “We are becoming more about instant gratification, we want what we want when we want it, and work is no different.”

“If businesses of today do not recognize the change that is happening, if they don’t adapt to it, they will become irrelevant tomorrow. Our goal is to help our customers adapt to this change by offering more flexibility in how they engage their workers. Our vision is to help these businesses thrive in the future world.”

"Great things happen outside of your comfort zone so we really like to aim high and shoot for it," says Ahmed.