Throughout this year organizations have ferociously adapted to the pandemic and its resultant work-from-home necessity. To stay afloat, companies need to find cloud services that effectively link remote teams, centralize working apps, documents, data and processes in a streamlined manner. Enter Tipalti, the startup that helps businesses automate their accounting functions such as managing suppliers, invoices, purchase orders, tax compliance, payments, billing and more - all from a single cloud-based platform.
Since its founding, Tipalti, which is Hebrew for “I’ll handle it,” was created to streamline the necessary area of accounts payable for businesses enabling them to free up personnel for other pressing functions. The company describes accounts payable as “the most time-consuming function in finance,” sharing that 47% of financial organizations indicated in a recent survey that they spend roughly 520 hours per year on manual accounts payable tasks. 27% of respondents shared that their teams dedicated up to 80 people-hours per month on AP tasks, or 1040 hours annually.
Today, the company mostly services mid-market companies with between 50 to 1000 employees. Its value has been noticed, with investors vying to contribute, despite Tipalti working on a model of accruing debts one year, raising capital the next. Despite this being a year to accrue debt, last week, the company left a Series E round of funding raising $150 million. Tipalti is now valued at $1.2 billion, quadrupling what it was worth last year, and making it the latest unicorn. The round was led by Durable Capital Partners with participation from Greenoaks Capital and existing investor 01 Advisors.
Speaking of the investment, CEO and founder Chen Amit said, “This is confirmation to what we know: We are leaders in this large category. There are major barriers to entry, and we are in a position to dominate and on a path to revolutionize.”
The numbers back the CEO’s confident stance, with Tipalti reportedly surpassing $12 billion in annual transaction volume this year, ending its second quarter with over 80% growth compared to the same quarter last year. Additionally, the company has more than 1,000 customers, and is opening a third office in Vancouver to assist its offices in San Mateo and Israel. The company counts Amazon, Twitch, Twitter, Fiverr, and Foursquare among its clients.
Tipalti currently employs 350 people around the world and intends to add an extra 100 to its Israel office in 2021, and a total of 250 worldwide, following the funding. Amit shared that the company intends to utilize its new capital to accelerate the current rate of growth and extend its global presence alongside fortifying staff across all departments.
