Chicago software company Mediafly announced an $80 million raise on Tuesday.
The funding round was led by BIP Ventures with support from Boathouse Capital and Mediafly insiders.
Mediafly's revenue enablement platform provides software to large organizations like Nestle, ADP, TransUnion, Adobe and Heineken that help their market-facing teams with sales. Mediafly's platform allows users to create and share content scaled across tens of thousands of sellers and buyers.
No. 3,258 on this year's Inc. 5000 list, with 156% revenue growth from 2019 to 2022, Mediafly has grown its customer base by 164% over the past 18 months.
Companies have to clear a high bar to raise money these days, and Mediafly's critical revenue enablement technology is well-positioned to lead the sector, said Mark Buffington, managing partner of BIP Ventures.
The funding comes as dealmaking and valuations have stagnated or declined across nearly all venture capital stages leading to what PitchBook analysts have called "the least startup-friendly environment" in more than a decade. About 15% of all funding rounds completed during the second quarter of the year have been down rounds, the highest quarterly figure since Q4, 2017, according to PitchBook.
At $80 million, Mediafly would have been one of the largest funding rounds for any startup in Q2 2023.
Mediafly co-CEO Mary Shea said part of the reason for the company's current success is its conservative growth strategy.
"[Mediafly founder and CEO] Carson Conant built the business up with conservative funding that was made up of angel investors and some debt capital back in the day when all of the current unicorns were raising hundreds of millions of capital to billion-dollar valuations," she said. "At the time it was a disadvantage to be undercapitalized."
Fast-forward to 2021, interest rates were on the rise and unpredictable economic headwinds led to a situation where companies were "choking" on high valuations.
Shea said this was essentially Mediafly's first "big growth equity round" with financing that amounts to 150% more than all of the previous rounds combined.
The funding puts the startup in a position where it does not need any future funding for operations. It will also be used to accelerate Mediafly's go-to-market strategy, which will include a rebrand and rename of the company.
