Since being launched just a few years ago, New Zealand-based cloud point-of-sale startup Vend has grown incredibly fast. But it expects that growth to accelerate, thanks to acute interest among customers into the cloud and an increased focus on new international markets.
To keep pushing forward, Vend has raised an additional $20 million in Series B funding from Peter Thiel international investment vehicle Valar Ventures, as well as Australian-based investment firm Square Peg Capital. With the funding, Vend plans to drastically expand its headcount, especially in the U.S. and Europe.
Every storefront needs a point-of-sale system to manage and track sales and inventory, but traditionally those systems have required a heavy upfront investment in proprietary systems with outdated software. Vend wants to change that, with a cloud-based system that not only costs much less than the competition, but is also more regularly updated with new features requested by customers.
That value proposition has resonated with customers, who have signed up in droves since launch. The technology is now being used in more than 10,000 stores across 100 countries worldwide. And revenue growth continues to accelerate, with Vend growing 300 percent year-over-year, according to founder and CEO Vaughan Rowsell.
That’s due, in part, to the maturity of its product, as well as growing adoption among storefronts. Once upon a time, its customers were primarily early adopters. But over time, more and more Main Street retail outlets are looking to the cloud for their point-of-sale offering.
In addition, Vend has seen demand from resellers and partners who have integrated with its service. That includes partners like payment processors PayPal and Square, online accounting platform Xero, inventory management company Stitch Labs, customer analytics company Swarm, and customer self-checkout provider SelfPay.
Customer adoption has been particularly strong in the U.S. After spending a couple of years refining its technology and marketing it in its home market of New Zealand and nearby Australia, Vend has made a big push in North America lately.
That includes the hiring of former Mint and Intuit exec Anton Commissaris as the company’s president of U.S. operations. It’s also opened offices in San Francisco and Toronto to support growth in North America.
With the new funding, the company plans to double down on those efforts. Rowsell tells me that after increasing personnel from 30 to 100 over the past year or so, it expects to double headcount again, with much of that hiring happening in the U.S. It also plans to open an office in Europe to begin its expansion there in earnest.
Vend has now raised about $30 million altogether. Other investors include Point Nine Capital, MYOB founder Craig Winkler, and Seek.com.au co-founders Paul Bassett and Matt Rockman, and The Milford Active Growth Fund.