Armed with a major round of funding, New York-based Jeeves announced September 2 it’s expanding within Canada as well as into Columbia, the United Kingdom, and Europe.
The all-in-one expense management platform for global startups said it has raised $57 million USD ($71.6 million CAD) for a valuation of $500 million USD ($600.1 million CAD). That round closed in the last week of August.
“Our goal is to get to 30 to 40 people in Canada across Vancouver and Toronto, so we’re hiring pretty aggressively in the market,” Jeeves co-founder and CEO, Dileep Thazhmon, told BetaKit in an interview. “A big part of this raise is to establish ourselves as the largest player in each local market, building and growing out the team in that region.”
“A big part of this raise is to establish ourselves as the largest player in each local market, building and growing out the team in that region.”
The $57 million USD Series B round, led by CRV, comes just two months after the company’s Series A round led by Andreesen Horowitz in June. In total, Jeeves has raised $183 million USD ($229.8 million CAD) in less than 90 days.
This Series B also includes participation from Tencent, Silicon Valley Bank, Alkeon Capital Management, Soros Fund Management and a key group of angel investors including Kevin Durant, Andre Igoudala, Odell Beckham Jr., and The Chainsmokers.
Other investors included the founders of eight unicorn companies — Adolfo Babatz (CEO, Clip), Gabriel Braga (CEO, QuintoAndar), Pierpaolo Barbieri (CEO, Uala), Zac Prince (CEO, BlockFi), Immad Akhund (CEO, Mercury), Pablo Gonzalez (Founder, Bitso), Tom Blomfield (Founder, Monzo Bank), Des Traynor (Founder, Intercom) and founders from UiPath, Auth0, GoCardless, Hashdex, Lithic, Frubana and Pomelo.
Cash, corporate cards with up to four percent cash back, and cross-border payments all run on the Jeeves proprietary infrastructure which allows companies to spin up their finance function within minutes. Jeeves can handle multiple currencies for payback. More than 1,000 global companies currently use Jeeves.
Beyond expansion, the FinTech startup intends to acquire new talent and accelerate the onboarding of new companies to the platform. Jeeves claims that, currently, more than 15,000 companies are on its waitlist for services. Of that number, Thazhmon noted that roughly 20 percent are Canadian.
Jeeves went live in March, and entered Canada quietly in the last four to five months, Thazhmon said. The company currently serves between 200 to 300 firms in Canada.
Across the company, Jeeves has close to 60 employees, with 10 in Canada. Out of that 10, eight were hired in the last month.
“We’re starting to expand pretty quickly,” Thazhmon said. “Our goal is on the ground in each region, including Canada, to have at least 40 people to be operational and scale at the pace and velocity we’re seeing.”
Of the latest round of funding, Thazhmon said it’s a validation of the investor’s belief in the market. “The space that we’re operating in, which is global B2B payments, especially across countries, is something that’s been growing substantially,” he noted.
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The global B2B payments market size was valued at $870.42 billion USD ($1.4 trillion CAD) in 2020, and is projected to reach $1.91 trillion USD ($2.3 trillion CAD) by 2028, according to an Allied Market Research report.
“Given the investments coming into Canada have grown at just a crazy pace in the last eight to 10 months, that’s good for us because if you have raised $50 million or $100 million as a company, you then need an infrastructure to spend it,” Thazhmon said. “So you’re not putting it in the bank. You’re using it for growth, and that’s where we can come in and collateralize that for you.”
Thazhmon previously founded PowerInbox, an email engagement and monetization firm, and previous to that was a graduate of Stanford, class of 2012.
On Thursday, Jeeves also announced Saar Gur, general partner at CRV, will join the board of Jeeves.
As well, Jeeves said key additions to its leadership team include chief people officer, Katharine Reaugh (Previously HR leader at Netflix, Facebook), head of Jeeves growth, Matthieu Hafemeister (a16z Fintech Partner, Jeeves Series A Lead), head of general managers, Andrés Echandi (Uber Lead for ACAC Region), head of compliance, Kiran Bassi (Pollen Street Capital, Morgan Stanley), and general counsel, Otis Carter (Kirkland Ellis, Ropes & Gray).
Led by Thazhmon and Sherwin Gandhi, Jeeves has grown its transaction volume by more than 5,000 percent since January and revenue has increased 1,150 percent since its Series A round earlier this year. Jeeves now covers more than 12 currencies and 10 countries across three continents.
“We’re not even really kicked into second gear in Canada, and that’s what part of this reach-out and fundraise is going to be,” Thazhmon concluded.
Feature Image courtesy of Jeeves
