Hubilo on Tuesday said it has raised $125 million (about Rs 943 crore) in funding, led by Alkeon Capital. Lightspeed Venture Partners and Balderton Capital also participated in the series B round. This brings the company''s total fund raise to $153 million to date.
Hubilo is a virtual events platform. CEO and founder Vaibhav Jain said the company will use the funds to further enhance its growth by developing new business functions, advance innovation of its platform, strengthen its product, engineering, and design teams in India, and go-to-market teams in the US, the UK, Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and Asia Pacific.
Hubilo also plans to set up new sales offices in key regions to expand its operations and reach a greater volume of customers.
In addition, Hubilo will increase the overall employee count by 150 per cent to support its rapid growth plans and to respond to the increased customer demand for virtual and hybrid events.
"We will be expanding our sales, partnerships, and business development divisions and setting up a complete Research and Development division that will conduct a series of experiments to ensure that Hubilo is building a completely future-proofed platform," Jain told PTI.
He added that the company will be setting up physical sales offices in the US, the UK, APAC, and EMEA regions.
"We shall be increasing our total headcount by 150 per cent, we will have 400-plus employees by the end of 2021 (December) and should be able to add at least 100 to 150 plus by the financial year, March 2022, considering that all our key regions will have a physical team in it," Jain said.
Founded in 2015 to build event tech that increased attendee engagement at in-person events, when the pandemic hit in 2020, Hubilo saw revenues dwindling to zero. The company reworked its technology in 26 days and designed an event platform, it said in press release.
It works with brands such as Blackboard, Walmart, United Nations, Roche Pharma, Maersk Shipping and others.
The Asia Pacific region accounts for 25 per cent of Hubilo''s business, and the company plans to further grow in the APAC region, especially in India.
