Anaplan, a San Francisco-based cloud software company, has become the latest technology firm to close venture capital (VC) financing. The latest round of VC funding at $90 million puts valuation of the company at $1.09 billion. Indian firm Premji Invest led the investment round. The company is also considering initial public offer (IPO) soon.
Anaplan develops planning software for businesses. It has raised $90 million in sizeable funding round in a busy month for VC financing, said Frederic Laluyaux, the company's CEO. Anaplan's previous investors also took part in this latest round of financing.
Reuters reports that with the latest round of VC financing, the total amount raised by Anaplan has reached to $240 million. Venture-supported companies across the world closed the financing rounds since 1 January 2016 with a combined value of $4.8 billion, according to CB Insights, a venture capital and angel investing database firm.
Anaplan is planning for initial public offer (IPO). Laluyaux said: "What we want is to be in a position to go IPO whenever we feel that the timing and markets are right. Right now the market is tough." However, Anaplan has not firmed up any specific time frame for IPO. It has hired James Budge as Chief Financial Officer to lead the IPO preparations.
Laluyaux said: "We are thrilled to welcome our new investors and James to the company. With James' tremendous track record we now have an outstanding finance executive on our team to guide our continued growth." Anaplan will make use of the mobilized money to meet the increasing global demand for cloud-based business planning and modeling platform, as reported by BusinessWire.
Not only Anaplan, there were other firms which have successfully mobilized funds. For instance, App analytics startup App Annie has closed $63 million funding round led by Greenspring Associates. App Annie offers data on mobile apps. Another data intelligence firm Looker has raised $48 million from venture capitalists Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.
Anaplan has reached to a stage where it should be a public company. Major global companies use Anaplan's core processes in their financial planning and analysis, as per a report by TechCrunch (TC). Anaplan plans to be a public company to better offer its services to the global market.
Major deals this year so far were $752 million round by Lyft, travel search site Skyscanner's $192 million and Flatiron Health's $175 million, according to CB Insights. Anaplan has surpassed its funding target by $15 million. Anaplan says that demands and expectations from investors are more for startups.
Anaplan has over 400 customers in 20 nations. The list of customers includes Hewlett-Packard, Motorola and DocuSign. Venture capital firms are equipped with more funds to offer for technology firms. US-based companies mobilized $5 billion in fourth quarter of 2015, according to National Venture Capital Association.
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