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Venture Capital News: Bigcommerce Secures $20M Series B

2012-09-05
AUSTIN, TX, Leading e-commerce platform for SMBs, today announced it has secured $20 million in Series B funding led by existing investors General Catalyst Partners.
Bigcommerce, the leading e-commerce platform for SMBs, today announced it has secured $20 million in Series B funding led by existing investors General Catalyst Partners and joined by new strategic investor, Mike Maples of FLOODGATE, bringing the company's total venture capital funding to $35 million. Bigcommerce is the fastest-growing e-commerce platform in the world with over 1,000 percent growth in SaaS revenue since launching in 2009.

"E-commerce is already booming and we're really focusing on how to help our clients sell more while leveraging affordable online channels that drive qualified traffic," said Eddie Machaalani, co-founder of Bigcommerce. "Small and medium businesses shouldn't need a degree in design and web development to run a successful online store. They want it to be easy and intuitive. We're radically simplifying the e-commerce experience, enabling the small business not just to compete with larger competitors, but win."

"We're building a global commerce platform for millions of small and medium businesses looking to generate more revenue," added Mitchell Harper, co-founder of Bigcommerce. "Whether you want to set up an online store, accept payments, launch a mobile commerce campaign or tie all of your systems together, you can do that with our platform."

The Series B round will fund accelerated product development for Bigcommerce as well as significant expansion of the sales and marketing teams. Bigcommerce has already doubled their global employee base in 2012 and plans to increase headcount by 70 percent over the next two years.

"E-commerce is a $400 billion market growing at massive rates," said Mike Maples, managing partner of FLOODGATE. "Bigcommerce has the team and the platform to take a leadership position in a big way and we are very excited to be involved at this stage."

"Bigcommerce has surpassed 'startup success story' status in the immense, fast-growing e-commerce solutions market," said Larry Bohn, managing director of General Catalyst. "Bigcommerce truly fulfills our vision of entrepreneurs helping entrepreneurs to build amazing, sustainable companies, and when you think about how far they've come just in the past year--approaching $1 billion in transactions--it's really incredible to see."

In addition to the VC funding news, Bigcommerce today revealed a significant brand overhaul in a move to 'consumerize' business software. The redesign includes a new Web site, app store and a fresh new look for the product with simpler design features. The brand overhaul also includes a new company logo and tagline, 'Sell More'. This core message defines what Bigcommerce is all about--helping small- and medium-sized businesses sell more and take advantage of the boom in e-commerce.

"Ease of use is the most important feature in software," said Machaalani. "We're significantly decreasing the barrier to entry for savvy entrepreneurs wanting to get into e-commerce."

"Our redesign is centered around making it easier for online retailers to, quite simply, sell more," added Harper.

The new brand launched today and can be viewed at www.bigcommerce.com .

About Bigcommerce

Bigcommerce is the leading e-commerce platform for SMBs, enabling them to easily launch professional online stores in hours, not weeks or months. Existing clients Gibson Guitar, Pandora Jewelers, Collette Dinnigan and Willie Nelson's Shop are using Bigcommerce's built-in e-commerce and marketing capabilities to sell more with less effort. Bigcommerce was founded in 2009 by two Aussies turned part-time Texans with a vision to build a scalable, powerful e-commerce platform for SMBs. For more information, visit http: http://www.bigcommerce.com .
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