Salesforce-backed HR tech turns 🦄 with $72m fundraise

Singapore-based Darwinbox, an HR-focused SaaS firm, has breached the US$1 billion valuation mark after raising US$72 million in a series D round led by Technology Crossover Ventures.

This brings the firm’s total funds raised to date to over US$110 million. Existing investors such as Salesforce Ventures, Sequoia, Lightspeed, SCB 10X, JG Digital Equity Ventures, Endiya Partners, and 3One4Capital also joined the round. It earlier raised US$15 million in a Salesforce-led round.

(From left) Darwinbox co-founders Chaitanya Peddi, Jayant Paleti, and Rohit Chennamaneni / Photo credit: Darwinbox

Founded in 2015, Darwinbox enables enterprises to centralize all of its HR processes, from hiring and payroll to employee management and benefits tracking. It also lets its users customize the system based on cultural and local specifications.

The SaaS firm will use the fresh funds to fuel its expansion in Asia, with plans to hire more than 100 people across Southeast Asia and another 100 in India this year. These new hires will be added to the company’s engineering, customer support, and sales and marketing teams in anticipation of increased business.

Darwinbox is aiming to strengthen its presence in Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, and Vietnam. It is also eyeing the Middle East and Japan.

“Suddenly, there was a lot more interest among companies to look at HR technology to automate their activities,” Darwinbox co-founder Rohit Chennamaneni told Tech in Asia. He added that firms began embracing the product’s benefits due to a “big shift in thinking” brought about by pandemic-driven remote working setups.

See also: Trends and pivots in the coronavirus economy

Darwinbox is also looking to add AI and machine learning features to its platform, allowing enterprises to speed up hiring and address employee attrition based on transactional data.

Chennamaneni said that the system can possibly notice employees’ level of engagement based on multiple touchpoints such as interaction, compensation, and leaves taken, allowing stakeholders to make data-guided actions. Due to the vast amount of data being generated constantly, it is easy to find patterns to “make more predictive decisions, where you need to intervene at the right time,” he told Tech in Asia.

The company said that it has seen a 300% growth in demand in the past year, with its product being used by 1.5 million employees from over 650 enterprises. These include regional firms like Zalora, Tokopedia, JG Summit Group, and Zilingo, as well as international brands like Starbucks, Nivea, and Axa.