Customer experience management company Alida secured an additional $3 million for its Series D round from BMO Capital, bringing the financing’s total to $23 million.
Founded in Vancouver in 2000, Alida claims to have created “the world’s first combined CXM (customer experience management) and insights platform,” which allows users to purchase individual products designed to improve the customer experience.
Initially launched as a market research firm named Vision Critical, Alida pivoted its services to focus on CXM software, customer insights, and facilitating “closed loop interactions.” Since the start of 2020, Alida has released 123 new product innovations and seven new Alida solutions.
The startup serves companies in four sectors: financial services, healthcare, retail, and technology, with the majority of its business currently in tech. Alida’s clients range from Twitter, VMware, and Toyota to Canadian Tire and Home Hardware.
“Over the past year, we have made huge strides in our innovation agenda and have seen our vision come to life,” said Ross Wainwright, CEO at Alida. “This investment strengthens Alida’s working capital position to grow key areas of our business, deliver marketing-leading solutions, and enhance the value for our current stakeholders.”
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Alida swapped CEOs in December 2019, adding Wainwright following some slower than expected growth and a period of infighting between former CEO Angus Reid (father of Alida founder Andrew Reid) and the company’s directors and shareholders at the time.
As Vision Critical, the company moved its headquarters to Toronto in 2019 where it also saw the appointment of Riaz Raiahan as president of products.
This marks the third equity investment for the company. In 2012, it received a $20 million investment from OMERS. The funding follows $12.3 million in debt financing in June, secured through Comerica Bank. As Vision Critical, the startup also raised nearly $27 million CAD in growth debt financing in July 2020 from Vistara Capital Partners.
Sanjiv Samant, managing partner of Round13 Capital joined Alida’s board of directors as part of the initial Series D funding round.
Alida intends to use the financing to accelerate its growth strategy and innovation agenda to further develop its suite of SaaS solutions.