Centivo revealed this summer that Buffalo would become its formal headquarters.
Now the health-tech startup has announced one of the biggest rounds of venture capital in the region’s history.
Centivo has raised $51 million in venture capital to support the rapid growth and expansion of its tech-enabled healthcare plans, which will be available in half of the top 20 American markets by the end of 2022. By using data and partnering directly with companies, Centivo leaders believe they can simultaneously improve care and reduce costs.
Read more about Centivo's decision to root its HQ in Buffalo
“In this era of COVID and challenging talent attraction and retention dynamics in the workforce, it gives us tremendous pride to help employers offer their employees 1980s levels of healthcare affordability while also saving their companies money,” Centivo founder and CEO Ashok Subramanian said.
Centivo has now raised $118 million in venture capital since it was founded by Subramanian in 2017. Subramanian formerly co-founded and led Liazon Corp. in Buffalo, which was acquired by the firm that became Willis Towers Watson. WTW still has a sizable presence in downtown Buffalo.
Subramanian lives in New York City but maintains close personal and professional relationships in Buffalo. Centivo opened a small office here a few years ago, and while it primarily considers talent over location, it plans to build its biggest employee cluster out of its Cheektowaga office.
Three top Centivo employees now lead the Buffalo office, including head of operations Paul Wann, chief people officer Stephanie Argentine and finance chief Tina Passariella.
About 52 of its 180 employees work out of Western New York.
Centivo’s round was led by B Capital Group and Maverick. Existing investors Bain Capital Ventures, Company Ventures, Define Ventures, F-Prime Capital, HarbourVest Partners, Ingleside Investors, Nassau Street Ventures also participated, along with various individual investors.
Centivo is the 22nd local company to acknowledge growth-oriented financing this year. The others include Jerry ($103 million), Squire ($60 million), Tackle.io ($35 million), Torch Labs ($25 million), CleanFiber ($11.9 million), Circuit Clinical ($7.5 million), SomaDetect ($6 million), Kickfurther ($5.9 million), HELIXintel ($1.6 million), Joblio ($4 million), Ognomy ($1.37 million), Patient Pattern ($1.2 million), Ellicottville Greens ($1 million), Immersed Games ($540,000), Braid Babes ($415,000), MemoryFox ($380,000), Zizo Technologies ($200,000), Thimble.io ($125,000), AirExpert ($100,000), HiOperator (undisclosed) and Classavo (undisclosed).
