Beckon Omnichannel Marketing Intelligence Software Secures $13M in Series B Funding
Beckon Set to Meet Global Demand for Its Omnichannel Analytics, Real-Time Dashboards and Marketing Scorecards
SAN MATEO, Calif., Jan. 27, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Beckon, the leading provider of marketing intelligence software, today announced that it has closed a $13M round of Series B funding, bringing the total investment in Beckon to $23M. Venture capital pioneer Venrock led the round, with participation by all previous Beckon investors including August Capital, Canaan Partners and El Dorado Ventures. The additional capital will be used to fund continued development of the Beckon platform as well as meet increased global customer demand.
Just 10 months after its public launch, Beckon has signed Coca-Cola, Gap, Microsoft, Intercontinental Hotel Group, Converse, BSkyB, Union Bank, Reebok, Jive, Dolby and many more global brands. "We're now working daily with CMOs and senior marketing executives from the world's best-loved brands," said Beckon CEO Jennifer Zeszut. "Our clients are some of the savviest marketers there are, but they've been wrestling with IT for years to get help with omnichannel data management and analytics. Or they've been hitting brick walls trying to make generic tools work for marketing. When CMOs see Beckon—built by marketers, for marketers—and how fast we can show what's working across it all, it's love at first sight."
Beckon's SaaS platform addresses marketers' most pressing needs in the era of "big data"—omnichannel data management, planning, analytics and reporting. Beckon unifies messy, disparate marketing data sets across online and offline channels and delivers rich marketing analytics, dashboards and scorecards—strategic, real-time views of omnichannel marketing performance. Beckon customers use the platform to manage spend more wisely across channels, tie marketing activities to business outcomes and become more effective storytellers of marketing success.
"Consumers are increasingly omnichannel and so marketing must be too," said Brian Ascher of Venrock, who joins the Beckon board with this investment. "With the explosion of new channels comes a proliferation of specialized tools, each with their own data formats and reports. Marketing teams are drowning in data and getting an omnichannel view of what's working best across it all has never been more difficult or more important. Beckon is the right product at the perfect time in marketing's history."
Established in 1969 to build on the early venture practices of Laurance Rockefeller, Venrock is one of the longest-standing venture capital firms. Early investments included Apple and Intel, and today Venrock continues to partner with entrepreneurs to build substantial companies and disrupt big markets. In 2014 alone, 10 Venrock portfolio companies went public and eight were acquired.
"It's rare to find a VC firm with their history, let alone their track record of success," said Zeszut. "But what really excites me is their strength in marketing technology. They know this space cold. Brian is an ex-marketer himself, and he instantly understood the huge, long-standing pain point that we are solving in a new way."
Beckon was founded in 2011 by Jennifer Zeszut (CEO), who has been a senior marketing leader for many years, and Jochen Frey (CTO), who has built large-scale data processing systems for over 20 years. Prior to Beckon, the two ran Scout Labs, a social media analytics company, which was acquired by Lithium Technologies in 2010. The Beckon leadership team has decades of experience in marketing, marketing data management, operations, customer success and analytics. The seasoned management team has been part of many successful exits: Scout Labs (acquired by Lithium); Razorfish (acquired by Avenue A); Aprimo (acquired by Teradata); Quigo (acquired by AOL); Eloqua (acquired by Oracle); and Crowd Factory (acquired by Marketo).
"The Beckon team is top-notch and knows how to win," said Ascher. "And we're especially excited about the Beckon offering. It's a brilliant take on an age-old marketing problem. They took a contrarian approach to marketing data management from the outset and built a beautiful product on top of a unique technical architecture. Marketers see Beckon and swoon. I've witnessed it first-hand."
To learn more, visit www.beckon.com.
About Beckon
Beckon is omnichannel analytics software for marketing in all its modern complexity. Our software-as-a-service platform integrates messy marketing data and delivers rich dashboards and scorecards for cross-channel marketing intelligence. Built by marketers for marketers, Beckon is the dashboard to the CMO—best-practice analytics and marketing-impact metrics right out of the box for ultra-fast time to marketing value. We serve marketers who want to bring order to chaos, make data-informed optimization decisions, and tell the marketing story in terms of business impact.
About Venrock
Originally established as the venture capital arm of the Rockefeller family in 1969, Venrock partners with entrepreneurs to build some of the world's most disruptive, successful companies. With a primary focus on technology and healthcare, portfolio companies have included Apple Computer, Athenahealth, Centocor, Check Point Software, DoubleClick, Endeca, Gilead Sciences, Idec Pharma, Imperva, Illumina, Intel, Millennium Pharma, Nest, SlideShare and Tudou. For more information, please visit Venrock's website at www.venrock.com and follow the firm on Twitter at @venrock.
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SOURCE Beckon
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