- Personalized text messaging SaaS platform Attentive announced recently that it raised $230 million in Series D funding at a $2.2 billion valuation led by Coatue
Personalized text messaging SaaS platform Attentive announced recently that it raised $230 million in Series D funding at a $2.2 billion valuation led by Coatue. Tiger Global, Wellington Management Company, D1 Capital Partners, Atomico, and Sozo Ventures are new investors in the company and they are joining existing investors Bain Capital Ventures, Sequoia, Sequoia Capital Global Equities, Coatue, IVP, Eniac Ventures, NextView Ventures, High Alpha, and Sapphire Ventures.
This investment comes only five months after the announcement of the extension of its Series C round totaling $110 million in April 2020. Including this funding round, Attentive has raised a total of $394 million—$340 million of which was secured in 2020. Now Attentive works with over 2,000 leading businesses such as Sephora, Tapestry (Coach, Kate Spade, Stuart Weitzman), Urban Outfitters, Michaels, Steve Madden, and Jack in the Box. On average, Attentive has been responsible for driving 18.5% of its customers’ total online revenue with a focus on increasing sales taking place on mobile devices.
The additional funding will be used to continue to accelerate the company’s rapid pace of product innovation and to invest in the hiring and professional development of top talent. And now Attentive has over 400 full-time employees, representing a 310% increase in headcount year-over-year. And more people have joined the company since the transition to remote work due to COVID-19 than were on the team prior to March.
Attentive was launched in 2016 by the team behind TapCommerce, the global leader in mobile app retargeting — which was acquired by Twitter in 2014. This team includes Attentive co-founder and chief product officer Andrew Jones, CEO and co-founder Brian Long, and co-founder and head of Special Projects Ethan Lo.
KEY QUOTES:
“Personalized two-way messaging at scale is the future of business-to-consumer communication. Mobile and e-commerce growth have been accelerated over a matter of months this year, creating a lasting impact on consumer behavior. Within a few years, consumers will expect all of their favorite brands and businesses to support real-time conversations via text messaging, in the same way they expect brands to have social media accounts today.”
— Brian Long, CEO & Co-Founder of Attentive
“Attentive has become an incredibly important part of our brand’s digital strategy and overall revenue growth. The platform’s capabilities and the team’s expertise in the text messaging space are both incredible, and have been integral to our success.”
— Jeff Silverman, President of Global E-Commerce at Steve Madden
“We continue to be very impressed by Attentive’s growth and performance and are very excited to expand our partnership with the team. We believe that mobile messaging will be how consumers will want to interact with businesses due to its immediacy, relevancy, and ease of use and believe that Attentive is strongly positioned as a leader in this space.”
— Lucas Swisher, Partner at Coatue
