Toast, a Boston-based restaurant technology company, just announced it has raised an oversubscribed $101 million Series C round to build upon its cloud-based platform.
The round, which was announced Tuesday, was led by Generation Investment Management, a firm chaired and co-founded by former Vice President Al Gore, and Lead Edge Capital. Bessemer Venture Partners and other existing investors also participated.
The company said the new financing will be used to invest further develop its online ordering service and cloud-based platform, enhance products like its self-ordering kiosks and pay-at-the-table devices and enable restaurants to provide more personalized experiences for customers. Toast's platform is built on top of Android's operating system.
"We’ve rapidly expanded our business over the past year by delivering on our mission and promise to be obsessed with customer success," Chris Comparato, a former Acquia executive who became Toast's CEO in 2015, said in a statement. "We plan to accelerate our growth even faster in the year ahead with strategic investments that will help our restaurant customers focus on delivering great food and guest experiences."
Toast said it has over 500 employees nationwide, with plans to hire an additional 1,000 within the next 18 months. The company has made some executive appointments this year, including Hugh Scandrett, a former IBM executive who became vice president of engineering, and John Morrison, who joined from Oracle MICROS.
The company said it has more than 50 mid-market and enterprise-level customers, including b.good, Sticky Fingers Ribhouse and Protein Bar.
"From its differentiated, all-in-one restaurant management and point of sale solution, to its explosive growth and world-class team of cloud technology engineers with a passion for restaurants, we know Toast is the future of restaurant technology," Brian Neider, partner at Lead Edge Capital, said in a statement.
