MEDIA RELEASE PR36786
Varicent Software Secures $35 Million in Funding to Further Accelerate Growth
TORONTO, Oct. 27 /PRNewswire-AsiaNet/ --
Company secures second-largest IT funding deal in Q3 2009
Varicent Software Incorporated, a leading innovator and provider of sales
performance management (SPM) and incentive compensation management (ICM)
solutions today announced it has raised $35 million in additional funding led
by San Francisco and New York-based FTV Capital. RBC Venture Partners and
EdgeStone Capital Partners, current investors in Varicent, also participated
in the new round of funding.
The deal was the second largest privately-funded information technology
funding announced in Q3 2009*, behind only Facebook. This represents both an
acknowledgement of the steep growth trajectory for the sales performance
management market, as well as Varicent's dominant role in the marketplace.
According to Ventana Research, the SPM market is growing at 45% annually and
in the U.S. alone is predicted to exceed more than $8 billion in 2010.**
"Varicent has developed a strong solution, assembled a driven,
experienced management team, and amassed an impressive customer list. We are
extremely enthusiastic about Varicent's leadership position and outlook for
continued rapid growth," said Eric Byunn, FTV Capital Partner. "FTV's
strategic limited partners - many of the world's largest financial
institutions - have a huge corporate pain point in ineffective sales
performance solutions. Varicent emerged at the top of our sector research
because its solutions are consistently providing corporations with a
measurable impact, driving sales effectiveness, increasing revenues,
decreasing costs and improving internal visibility."
The funds raised will allow Varicent to continue its momentum as the
leader in the SPM market. The company plans to further expand its
international business, building on the successful launch of EMEA and APAC
operations earlier in the year, accelerate the development of new features
and functionality in its innovative sales performance management solution,
Varicent SPM, broaden its reach into new verticals, and advance its
mid-market penetration.
"FTV Capital is a great partner and brings to us an extensive, highly
attractive financial services network - a key industry vertical for
Varicent," said Dan Shimmerman, President and CEO, Varicent Software. "We
have achieved remarkable success because our solutions deliver real,
measurable and positive results to our customers. We look forward to working
with FTV's strategic partners to help resolve their unmet needs in SPM."
"The explosive market growth in SPM is being fueled by organizations who
realize their path to renewed success requires a focus on improved sales
effectiveness and a faster response to new opportunities and challenges,"
noted Shimmerman. "Sales performance management arms decision makers with the
latest and most accurate information on who is selling what to whom. It
builds organizational alignment by ensuring that compensation plans are
quickly implemented and changed to drive desired behaviors."
"We have two primary goals in adopting sales performance management,"
said Mark Towne, Director Global Information Services, Smith & Nephew, Inc.
"The first was to find a solution that would allow us to quickly model new
plans in order to keep up with the ever changing requirement of our business.
The second goal was to select a sales performance management platform that
our many divisions can standardize on, making our processes and procedures
uniform across the business. Varicent SPM was selected based on their ability
to provide us the speed, flexibility and visibility for our sales
compensation across all of our business units."
Varicent is also pleased to announce the appointment of Eric Byunn,
Partner, Head of Software for FTV Capital to Varicent's Board of Directors,
effective immediately. In addition to Mr. Byunn, the following directors
currently serve on the company's board:
- Dan Shimmerman, President and CEO, Varicent Software Incorporated
- Marc Altshuller, EVP, Worldwide Field Operations, Varicent Software
Incorporated
- Robert Antoniades, Managing Director, RBC Venture Partners
- Bryan Kerdman, Partner, EdgeStone Capital Partners
- Janet Perna, former senior executive at IBM
- David Mahoney, former CEO of Applix Software
About Sales Performance Management (SPM)
SPM is a highly effective new approach in business management that works
to close the gap between business strategy and actual sales performance.
Varicent SPM is the only solution on the market today that automates and
accelerates all the core processes involved in SPM including incentive
compensation management, territory management, quota planning and roster
management. Its powerful reporting, analysis, modeling and planning tools
allow every department within an organization the visibility they need to
accurately predict and effectively achieve stronger sales performance.
According to the Gartner, Inc. report Sales Performance Management: How
It Relates to and Differs from CPM, "SPM represents a combination of
operational and analytic software capabilities that automate and integrate
functions for planning, designing, allocating and managing sales territories,
quotas and compensation plans. These applications help enterprises improve
the organization, direction and motivation of sales teams to achieve
sustained improvements in revenue and margin production."
About FTV Capital
FTV Capital is a multi-stage private equity firm that invests in
high-growth companies offering a range of innovative solutions. FTV Capital
provides entrepreneurs with unique access to its Global Partner Network, a
group of the world's foremost financial institutions that have invested in
FTV Capital and its portfolio companies for more than a decade. Founded in
1998, FTV Capital has more than $1 billion under management and has offices
in San Francisco and New York. For more information, please visit
About RBC Venture Partners
RBC Venture Partners(TM) is a dedicated team of venture capital
professionals specializing in early-stage investments in software and
services for enterprise, financial services, and mobile applications.
About EdgeStone
EdgeStone is one of Canada's leading private equity firms and has managed
in excess of CDN$2.3 billion of private capital on behalf of institutional
and high net worth clients. EdgeStone provides capital, strategic direction
and business and financial advice to help promising mid-market and
early-stage companies achieve their full potential. EdgeStone leverages the
resources of its broad business network and ensures an alignment of interests
to achieve superior returns for all stakeholders. EdgeStone is one of the
principal entities of GMP Capital Inc. (TSX: GMP).
About Varicent Software Incorporated
Varicent Software Incorporated is an innovative software solutions
provider delivering measurable improvements to its clients businesses through
its industry-leading sales performance management solution Varicent SPM.
Varicent's customers are high-performing companies representing a variety of
industries and include Waste Management, Convoy Financial Group,
Sherwin-Williams, Manpower, Autodesk, Getty Images, Starwood Hotels, Sun Hung
Kai Financial, and many others. For more information, please visit
* Dow Jones VentureSource - U.S. Venture Capital Financing, 3Q09 -
** Ventana Research - "Potential Market Size for Sales Performance
Management" - Article ID V08-18 - 4/29/2008.
(c)2009 Varicent Software. All rights reserved. Varicent and Varicent SPM
are trademarks of Varicent Software Incorporated.
All other trademarks and company names mentioned are the property of
their respective owners.
Contact: Brian Hartlen Claudia Husemann
Varicent Software Hill & Knowlton
T: 1.416.987.1241 T: 1.212.885.0378
E: bhartlen@varicent.com E: claudia.husemann@hillandknowlton.com
SOURCE: Varicent Software Incorporated
CONTACT: Brian Hartlen of Varicent Software,
+1-416-987-1241,
bhartlen@varicent.com, or
Claudia Husemann of Hill & Knowlton,
+1-212-885-0378,
claudia.husemann@hillandknowlton.com
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