[Funding alert] Team collaboration platform Symphony Communications raises $165M in new capital
Symphony plans to use the new capital to evolve its new Market Solutions business, accelerate growth in current and new markets, and build out its feature stack.
![[Funding alert] Team collaboration platform Symphony Communications raises $165M in new capital](https://images.yourstory.com/cs/2/a9efa9c0-2dd9-11e9-adc5-2d913c55075e/165-VC-funding1552277843560.jpg?mode=crop&crop=faces&ar=2%3A1&format=auto&w=1920&q=75)
Team collaboration platform Symphony Communication Services LLC on Wednesday announced that it had raised $165 million in new capital from Standard Chartered and MUFG Innovation Partners Co Ltd, along with a group of existing and other investors. This brings the total capital raised by the company to over $460 million.
Symphony will use the new capital to evolve its new Market Solutions business, to accelerate growth in both its current and new markets, and further build out its feature stack to deliver a new wave of innovation to enterprises as they replace traditional collaboration tools.
Founded in October 2014 and headquartered in Palo Alto, California, Symphony offers a secure team collaboration platform that transforms the way users communicate with a single workflow application.
Speaking on the funding, David Gurlé, Founder and CEO of Symphony, said,
“Capital Markets’ interest in accelerating Symphony’s growth is as strong as ever. We are very pleased to welcome Standard Chartered and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group to our strategic investor community.”
Michael Elanjian, Head of Digital Strategy & Fintech, Corporate & Investment Bank, JP Morgan, said: “We are excited to repeat our support and commitment to the growth of Symphony with an additional investment. Symphony’s unique, secure and compliant workflow platform is driving meaningful transformation in our industry for us and our clients.”
Over the last year, the platform claims to have surpassed 430,000 licensed users from over 60 countries, and has witnessed development of more than 1,000 bots and apps on the Symphony platform by its community of customers and partners.
“While we’re thrilled with Symphony’s traction and global network buildout, we also believe the transformative period of Symphony’s journey is just beginning,” said Darren Cohen, Global Head of Principal Strategic Investments (PSI), Goldman Sachs.
Symphony Market Solutions, a new business, was also launched last year to help customers speed up their digital transformation initiatives via workflow automation along with a suite of standardised, licensable software solutions.
“Digital transformation is central to Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group’s future business, and collaboration with fintech companies is a crucial part of that process. Forming agile partnerships with exciting and innovative companies like Symphony helps us remain a partner of choice in a changing world,” said Nobutake Suzuki, President, and CEO, MUFG Innovation Partners.
The last year also saw the company grow its talent pools across its development centres in Palo Alto, California; Stockholm, Sweden; and Sophia-Antipolis, France.
“Standard Chartered is excited to support Symphony. This strategic investment will provide the bank with greater insights into future trends in the enterprise communication and workflow collaboration space. Furthermore, as a leading global bank, Standard Chartered would look to assist Symphony to grow in our footprint markets across Asia, Africa and the Middle East,” said Alex Manson, Global Head of SC Ventures, Standard Chartered.
