Internet Of Things Platform Provider Jasper Wireless Hires Rajat Bahri As CFO

Jasper Wireless, one of the oldest and largest providers of machine-to-machine and “Internet of Things” connectivity, has brought on a new CFO to help keep track of its growing business. Rajat Bahri, who had previously served as CFO of publicly traded Trimble Navigation, will head up finance for Jasper as it expands globally.

Bahri has more than 20 years of experience in the finance world, including an eight-year stint at Trimble, where he saw revenues grow from $400 million to $2 billion during his tenure. According to Jasper Wireless CEO Jahangir Mohammed, it became time to hire a CFO of Bahri’s stature because the company had reached a certain scale of revenue and complexity of business, and it wanted a CFO who had run global operations for a similar organization.

Jasper Wireless was one of the earliest entrants in the Internet of Things space, like before it was called the “Internet of Things.” Founded in 2005, the company has been providing machine-to-machine connectivity to a wide range of companies across a number of verticals, with a highly scalable — and configurable — platform for doing so.

The company now works with more than 2,500 enterprises around the world and 15 different operators groups globally. Those enterprises span industries that include automotive, energy & smart grid, security, and mobile healthcare, as Jasper seeks to make a growing number of devices smarter and more connected. It operates on a Saas-based model, with its customers paying a fee for each device that’s connected to its platform.

Jasper has raised $148 million from investors that include Sequoia Capital, Benchmark Capital, and AllianceBernstein. The company now has customers in more than 100 countries around the world, according to Mohammed, and has a team that’s globally distributed. It also has ambitions to (someday) go public, although Mohammed deferred when I asked how soon. Anyway, those are all good reasons for bringing on a CFO with that type of experience.

So the next time you start your Nissan automobile connects wirelessly to the Interwebs, just think — there’s a dude out there who’s keeping track of all the numbers and finances for the company that makes that connectivity possible… and his name is Rajat Bahri.