McLean, Va.-based Lavrock Ventures has led a $8 million Series A for Fount Global, Inc., an “employee experience” firm headquartered in the national capital. Baltimore’s Grotech Ventures and Pennsylvania-based Osage Venture Partners were the other investors. Fount has so far raised $10.75 million in just over a year since its inception.
“Post-pandemic shifts in employee expectations and CEOs prioritizing efficiency across their global organizations have put pressure on HR leaders looking for smarter ways to hang on to the people most important to their business and remove friction from their daily work,” said Daniel Hanks, general partner at Lavrock Ventures and a board memberat Fount.
“Fount has made significant traction in large enterprises by seizing on these trends and addressing a business issue that is both timely and timeless,” added Hanks, who previously co-founded and ran the hyperlocal logistics firm SnapDash.
Fount, spun out of the German HR consulting firm TI People last year, found early success in designing a “human-centered” framework in 2018. Working alongside 30 global organizations, such as Adidas, Siemens, Baloise and Northwell Health, it launched a SaaS solution for measuring employee experience insights in 2021, and was spun off as a separate company a year later.
In its first year, the SaaS provider claimed more than doubling annual recurring revenue and adding 10 new enterprise customers, sustaining its growth momentum. The company reckons it can significantly pare down the estimated $746 million each Fortune 500 company loses annually in “unmanaged friction” via attrition, burnout and wasted productivity.
“Our solution addresses a challenge shared by both HR and business leaders – to reduce the headwinds people encounter at work,” said Fount CEO Christophe Martel, a co-founder of TI People who works out of Fount’s U.S. office. “Fount data provides a level of insight that empowers our customers to know where to take specific action and realize a quantifiable ROI.”
Fount’s Backers
Commercial Real Estate
MacKenzie Companies
Advertising / Media / Communications / Public Relations
Nevins & Associates
Financial Services / Investment Firms
Chesapeake Corporate Advisors
Commercial Real Estate
Monday Properties
Venture Capital
Blue Delta Capital Partners
Internet / Technology
Foxtrot Media
Lavrock Ventures has raised $45 million via two funds since its establishment in 2015. It has made 25 portfolio investments and three exits. Its recent investments include PteroDynamics, Apkudo, Expeto, Via Satellite and Morpheus Space.
Founded in 1984, Grotech Ventures has raised over $1.4 billion, and made over 150 portfolio investments and 40-plus exits. Industry veteran Lawson DeVries has served as Grotech’s managing general partner since 2020. He has been closely associated with a number of Grotech portfolio companies that have been acquired, among others, by giants such as Cisco and Oracle.
Osage Venture Partners, headquartered in Bala Cynwyd, Pa., was founded in 2005. It has raised $331 million from four funds, and made over 60 investments, mainly in early-stage B2B companies, according to Crunchbase. Its exits total 19. Its recent portfolio investments include Curavit Clinical Research, Connectbase, Trinsic, Tellie and DeepSurface Security.
