{"id":337184,"date":"2017-03-30T21:34:41","date_gmt":"2017-03-30T13:34:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/techcrunch.com\/?p=1470754"},"modified":"2017-03-30T21:34:41","modified_gmt":"2017-03-30T13:34:41","slug":"looker-catches-the-fancy-of-capitalg-goldman-and-geodesic-with-81-5m-series-d","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/looker-catches-the-fancy-of-capitalg-goldman-and-geodesic-with-81-5m-series-d\/","title":{"rendered":"Looker catches the fancy of CapitalG, Goldman and Geodesic with $81.5M Series D"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Business intelligence platform Looker is announcing a wholesome $81.5 million Series D today led by CapitalG, Alphabet\u2019s cleverly named growth investment arm. Goldman Sachs and Geodesic Capital helped fill out the round, joining\u00a0existing investors, KPCB, Meritech Capital Partners, Redpoint and Sapphire Ventures.<\/p>\n

Rather than compete\u00a0in segmented markets against visualization and data preparation startups, Looker wants to own the vertical of business intelligence.\u00a0The company\u00a0supports the adoption of enterprise machine learning by providing a source of clean and reliable data.<\/p>\n

Pushing up hard against IBM Cognos and Tableau, Looker has been able to grow its market share in the\u00a0competitive enterprise business intelligence space.\u00a0Frank Bien, CEO of Looker, told TechCrunch that the company has doubled its customers from 400 to 800 in the last year.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Frank Bien, CEO of Looker<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Though startups don\u2019t afford us the transparency of raw revenue and growth numbers,\u00a0Bien characterizes today\u2019s round as \u201cpreemptive.\u201d Google (Alphabet) can support the growth of Looker\u2019s data infrastructure while Goldman Sachs offers advisory perks.<\/p>\n

\u201cGoogle has a reach to help and bring expertise that\u2019s beneficial to a company at scale,\u201d said Bien.<\/p>\n

The relationship between Google and Looker is not new. The tech company\u00a0awarded Looker its Global Partner Award for Solution Innovation\u00a0during its Cloud Next conference earlier this month.\u00a0Looker also maintains good relations with Google Cloud competitor Amazon Web Services via a partnership with Amazon Redshift, the company\u2019s data warehousing solution.<\/p>\n

On the enterprise side, Goldman has had an active 2017 \u2014 seven\u00a0of its last ten pre-IPO equity\u00a0deals have involved startups in the space, according to data pulled from CrunchBase. Goldman held a financial stake in AppDynamics. The startup head-faked the tech industry opting to accept a last minute acquisition in the face of a looming IPO. Make of that what you will.<\/p>\n

Partnerships and capitalization tables aside,\u00a0Bien is adamant that he\u2019s growing an independent business. Founded in 2011, the startup is perhaps a bit young to be stressing over an initial public offering, but that seems to be the direction it\u2019s headed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re aiming to build a strong independent business,\u201d added Bien. On day one we started with a\u00a0platform play.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s round brings the company\u2019s total fundraising to $177.5\u00a0million. A significant chunk of the company\u2019s capital has gone toward increasing its headcount. Looker added 100 employees\u00a0throughout 2016. It now supports\u00a0nearly 400 employees that service North America and Europe.\u00a0Bien is bullish that\u00a0Geodesic can help the startup catalyze new growth in China.<\/p>\n

The company seemingly has a thing for Q1 fundraising, previous closing $30 and $48 million rounds\u00a0in Q1 2015 and 2016 respectively. But despite the brisk pace of growth, it doesn\u2019t surpass Slack\u2019s busy 2014 when it raised both a $42.7 million Series C and a $120 million Series D.<\/p>\n

Featured Image: bubaone, joingate\/Getty Images<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"\" Business intelligence platform Looker is announcing a wholesome $81.5 million Series D today led by CapitalG, Alphabet’s cleverly named growth investment arm. Goldman Sachs and Geodesic Capital helped fill out the round, joining\u00a0existing investors, KPCB, Meritech Capital Partners, Redpoint and Sapphire Ventures.
\nRather than compete\u00a0in segmented markets against visualization and data… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n

\n<\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a>\n<\/div>\n

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