Planera, a construction CPM scheduling and planning solution, announced that it has raised $13.5 million in a Series A funding round led by Sierra Ventures, with participation from Sorenson Capital, Brick and Mortar Ventures, Prudence VC and Firebolt Ventures.
This funding will enable Planera to accelerate the development and deployment of its innovative, collaborative, and visual planning tools, addressing the growing needs of general contractors (GCs), specialty subcontractors, and the wider construction sector.
General contractors have typically depended on several legacy software systems for managing commercial construction projects. And these platforms have become outdated and miss the critical shifts to the Cloud, Lean construction methodologies, and AI advancements. They also fall short of offering collaborative features and the visual elements essential for thinkers in the construction industry. This has created a major gap in the market, one that Planera is uniquely positioned to fill.
Nitin Bhandari (CEO and co-founder of Planera) is a serial entrepreneur with two successful exits. And this is his third startup, and he is joined by CTO Erik Swenson, his co-founder from their previous venture, bringing over 15 years of collaboration experience. They are joined by Saif Lodhi who has 30+ years of construction experience.
KEY QUOTES:
“This funding milestone brings us closer to our vision of empowering teams with the technology they need to plan, schedule, and collaborate more effectively to deliver optimal outcomes for complex construction projects. We’re seeing strong demand for long term as well as weekly planning tools, and we are heavily investing in more advanced features like quality checks, performance analytics and construction-specific AI to better anticipate and manage unexpected project challenges. This oversubscribed Series A funding will allow us to accelerate product development, expand sales and marketing efforts, and expand our reach within the construction industry.”
- Nitin Bhandari, CEO and co-founder of Planera
“Planera’s innovative approach to leveraging SaaS in the construction industry is a testament to the transformative power of intelligent applications. The industry is ripe for disruption with the shift towards collaborative, cloud-based, and visually-driven solutions. Planera’s team has the proven expertise and vision to lead this change and deliver immense value to general contractors.”
- Shashank Saxena, managing partner at Sierra Ventures
“The construction industry can drive better project outcomes only if the entire project team participates in creating, maintaining, and optimizing project schedules and plans on an ongoing basis. Planera is the only platform that has allowed us to move our teams in that direction.”
- Troy Thompson, COO at Big-D Construction, one of the construction industry’s top 50 GCs
“Planera is the only company that has successfully challenged the incumbents and gained impressive early traction in the project planning software space. The company’s innovative solution, customer-centric approach, and world-class team make them poised for explosive growth.”
- Kaustubh Pandya, Partner, Brick and Mortar
