Paris-based startup Pigment has secured an impressive $145 million in funding, only five years after its launch. This enterprise software company offers a cutting-edge business planning platform that enables large companies to visualize their past financial performance and forecast their future quarters with ease.
This funding round comes as a surprise, given the scarcity of such large rounds in France. According to EY’s recent study, funding for the French tech ecosystem has decreased by 38% in 2023 compared to 2022.
However, when you consider removing flashy AI startups such as Mistral AI, and non-tech startups like EV charging networks (Driveco) and EV battery factories (Verkor), the decline in funding rounds is even more drastic. Pure software startups have undeniably faced tough times in the past few years.
Pigment, on the other hand, is a clear exception with its impressive Series D funding. Existing investor Iconiq Growth has doubled down by leading this new funding round. Renowned names like Sandberg Bernthal Venture Partners, IVP, Meritech, Greenoaks, and Felix Capital are all participating, with many of them already being existing investors.
So, why has Pigment managed to raise such a significant amount of funding at a higher valuation, less than a year after its previous round? Well, the startup has achieved exponential growth, tripling its revenue and doubling its customer base in 2023. Its impressive list of clients includes big names like Unilever, Datadog, Kayak, and Merck, with half of its clients being US-based.
Co-founder and co-CEO Éléonore Crespo shared, “Our current investors suggested that instead of waiting 18 months to raise funds and scale with other companies, why not take advantage of their offer for an internal round with great terms right now? Everything happened very quickly… In just one week, it was a done deal.”
Prior to Pigment, Crespo worked at the renowned VC firm Index Ventures and Google. She co-founded Pigment with Romain Niccoli, who was also the co-founder and CTO of another early success story in the French tech ecosystem, adtech startup Criteo.
“IVP, one of our backers, benchmarks the growth rate of all SaaS companies. And since we started selling our product, we have consistently been among the top 5% of SaaS companies with the best revenue growth rate,” Crespo proudly stated.
Pigment’s revolutionary business planning tool is a flexible platform used by chief financial officers and finance teams for creating reports and budgets. Being a modern SaaS platform, it seamlessly integrates with all other company data (ERP, HRIS, data lakes, etc.) to serve as a collaborative tool.
Aside from finance teams, Pigment is also utilized by sales teams to set quotas and track performance against quarterly targets, as well as by HR teams for workforce scaling based on strategic changes and financial objectives.
Crespo shared, “We have worked hard to cater to other teams, not just finance teams. We have developed several modules that enable us to serve HR teams, supply chain teams, and sales teams.”
In fact, as more teams start using Pigment, it has become an essential tool for cross-team collaboration. And it outperforms legacy tools from giants like Oracle and SAP.
Like many software companies, Pigment has also incorporated AI features. Being the central repository for all essential company metrics, Pigment’s AI can quickly provide answers to user inquiries in natural language. For instance, a user can ask, “Can you break down the revenue by country?” or “Why was our actual revenue lower than forecast last quarter for this product?”
What’s even more impressive is that the company has optimized its core product to handle large datasets and complicated calculations with ease. The best enterprise software products are often considered must-haves for companies, meaning that significant resources are not required to improve the product. However, Pigment is still a challenger in this industry and believes that offering a better product is crucial in competing with other business planning tools.
