Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Fusebill and Vindicia are the latest to attract big investors

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Bigstock

Subscription management and billing platforms are big business, making it attractive for companies ripe for acquisition and drawing investors eager to get in on the action. Last week alone Fusebill announced a major investment and Vindicia was acquired by Amdocs.

Last week subscription management platform Fusebill announced it has secured an additional $6 million in equity funding. This latest funding round was led by ScaleUp Ventures and Langdell Investments. As part of the funding, Kent Thexton of ScaleUp Ventures and Pratik Budhdev of Langdell Investments will join Fusebill’s board of directors, with Thexton serving as chairman of the board. OMERS Ventures and BDC Capital also contributed to the Series A round of funding.

Tyler Eyamie, CEO of Fusebill, commented on the addition of the new directors.

“We are very excited to have both Kent and Pratik on our Board. Their expertise with developing high-growth technology companies in the billing and subscription monetization space will be instrumental to the next stage of our success,” said Eyamie.

Since launching the company in 2011, the Ottawa-based Fusebill has doubled revenue every year and has grown its client base to include hundreds of clients around the world, including INSzoom, Churchill Downs and ClearPathGPS.

“They have the tenacity and vision to rise to the top of one of the hottest trends, especially for ecommerce businesses and other companies looking to monetize IoT. This is the right team and the right product to successfully address the pains SMEs experience in managing the ongoing recurring relationships with clients,” said Thexton.

The Series A funding will be used to support Fusebill’s product development efforts, accelerate global expansion in sales, and scale ahead the increasing demand for cloud-based subscription management solutions. It could also help Fusebill gain market share in the small to medium-sized business category.

Fusebill is not the only subscription management platform in the news this week. Vindicia, a privately-held 13-year-old company serving subscription based companies, was acquired by Amdocs as part of a three-company purchase. Amdocs will pay a total of $260 million in cash for Vindicia, Brite:Bill and Pontis. Amdocs has not yet said how this acquisition would affect Vindicia’s current management or operations.

Two other subscription management and billing platforms also completed significant funding rounds this year. In June, Zuora – the largest of such firms in terms of annual revenue – raised an undisclosed amount on the secondary market to add to the $242.5 million raised in six previous rounds of founding. In February, Aria Systems, raised $50 million in its Series E round of equity funding, bringing its funding total to $132.3 million, according to Crunchbase.

Translation: subscription billing means big bucks for global companies who have found a way to help companies manage subscriptions and recurring revenue and all of the tasks they entail. To give you an overview of the biggest players on the subscription management and billing scene, we’ve prepared this round-up, including a brief description of each company and a summary of key financials like estimated annual revenue and total funding raised to date. The companies are listed in alphabetical order.

Aria Systems (http://ariasystems.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Aria Systems

Based in San Francisco, the 13-year-old Aria Systems offers subscription companies a cloud-based platform to manage recurring revenue, monetization, lifetime value, billing, web commerce and more. Managed by president and CEO Tom Dibble, Aria Systems primarily focuses on the High-Tech, Media, Communication, Cloud and Finance industries. Its customers include Audi, Adobe, Dell, Constant Contact, Experian and Netgear.

Chargebee (http://chargebee.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Chargebee

Based in India, Chargebee is a Level 1 PCI-compliant SaaS provider offering recurring billing and invoicing services for subscription based companies, allowing those companies to manage subscriptions at scale. They work with more than 50 payments gateways including Amazon Payments, PayPal, Stripe, Worldpay and Braintree. Its customers include Fujitsu, Sharetribe, Freshdesk and Soylent. The company is supported by key investors Accel Partners and Tiger Global Management, LLC.

Chargify (http://chargify.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Chargify

As Level 1 PCI-compliant company, Chargify provides flexible subscription and recurring billing solutions for companies of all sizes including subscription based companies and companies with recurring revenue and invoicing needs. Chargify’s solutions support a variety of payment gateways including Authorize.Net, Stripe, Braintree, PaymentExpress and eWay. Founded in 2009, Chargify clients include Grasshopper, Rackspace, Citrix, News Corp and Shave Kit. Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks and an investor on “Shark Tank,” was an early investor, supporting the company in 2011.

Fusebill, Inc. (http://fusebill.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Based in Ottawa, Canada, Fusebill is a cloud-based software platform that simplifies subscription billing by automating manual accounting, financial processes and workflows for small and medium-sized businesses. Founded in 2011 by CEO Tyler Eyamie and CTO Greg Burwell, the company is privately held, the company offers subscription management, recurring revenue, recurring billing and invoicing, and payments and collections. The company boasts hundreds of active accounts, 10 million-plus customers billed annually, more than 100,000 invoices sent daily and more than 10,000 credit cards charged daily.

goTransverse (http://www.gotransverse.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: goTransverse

goTransverse is a cloud-based monetization and subscription management platform that allows for a variety of subscription and usage based scenarios, including usage based billing, dynamic pricing, native revenue recognition, payment processing and more. Its services help companies to drive revenue, improve visibility and increase savings. goTransverse clients include Starz Play, Genetec, IBM, Edgenet and Media Ocean.

Recurly (http://recurly.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Recurly

As a PCI Level 1-compliant provider, Recurly offers an enterprise-class subscription management platform with notable clients including Sling, BarkBox, Twitch, HubSpot, CBS Interactive, JibJab and AccuWeather. Recurly works with a variety of billing models and payment gateways, offering clients of all sizes flexibility and giving them the ability to grow revenue. The Recurly platform also offers subscription management tools that help companies reduce churn and maximize lifetime value. Currently, Recurly has 2,687 subscribers to its Pro plan, and 2,102 subscribers to its Basic plan.

Vindicia (http://vindicia.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Vindicia

Managed by chairman and CEO Gene Hoffman, Vindicia was founded in 2003. It is headquartered in Redwood, California and is privately held. Vindicia provides subscription billing and recurring revenue solutions including subscription billing, business model optimization, subscription payments, customer acquisition, customer retention and subscriber lifecycle management. While it serves a variety of industries, it is primarily focused on SaaS and Services, OTT and Entertainment and Media and Content. Clients include AllRecipes, Vimeo, LifeLock, Angie’s List, Mind Candy and Zillow.

Last week Amdocs announced that it had purchased Vindicia, along with Brite:Bill and Pontis, two other privately-held companies, in a cash sale for approximately $260 million. The purchase was in line with Amdocs digital strategy, helping them to become a market leader in providing digital solutions to their customers.

Zuora, Inc. (http://zuora.com)

Subscription Billing Firms Raise Millions in Funding Rounds

Source: Zuora

Headquartered in Foster City, California, Zuora was founded by K. V. Rao, Cheng Zou and Tien Tzuo in 2007. Lead by CEO Tien Tzuo, the privately-held Zuora offers a subscription management software platform that facilitates a variety of services including recurring billing, recurring revenue, multi-channel commerce, global payments and inventory management. The company works with subscription companies in a variety of industries including Media, Internet of Things, Healthcare, Education, B2C, Cloud Applications and Infrastructure and Communications.

 

  Founded Annual Revenue Total Equity Funding # of Rounds Most Recent Round Notes
Aria Systems 2003 $31 million $132.3 million 5 Feb. 2016 Series E, $50 M
Chargebee 2011 $7.4 million $6.17 million 3 March 2015 Series B, $5 M
Chargify 2009 $6.0 million Unknown 1 July 2011 Series A; undisclosed amount
Fusebill 2011 $10 million $9.41 million 3 Sept. 2016 Series A; $6 M
goTransverse 2008 $41 million $47 million 2 Oct. 2014 Private Equity; $25 M
Recurly 2009 $18.4 million $19.6 million 3 Oct. 2014 Series B; $12 M
Vindicia 2003 $12.3 million $37.6 million 5 Nov. 2010 Series E; $20 M; acquired by Amdocs Sept. 2016
Zuora 2007 $75 million $242.5 million 7 June 2016 Undisclosed amount raised

 

 

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