A Toronto-based machine learning startup with Cincinnati ties closed a multi-million dollar Series A fundraising round this week.
Tealbook, which uses AI and machine learning to sift and evaluate massive amounts of data needed to make procurement decisions, said Tuesday it closed a $14.4 million Series A round by led by RTP Global, an early stage venture capital firm with offices in India, London and New York.
Over-the-Rhine's Refinery Ventures also participated in the raise, marking its second such financial commitment to the startup. Other investors include: BDC Capital, Grand Ventures, Reciprocal Ventures, S&P Global, Stand Up Ventures and Workday Ventures with debt financing from Silicon Valley Bank.
The Series A comes 12 months after Tealbook’s last raise, a $5 million “seed-plus” round led by Refinery in January 2020. In a release, Tealbook said it will use the new funds to support further innovation and drive sales and marketing initiatives.
Tealbook, founded in 2014, is a intelligence platform for suppliers that wants to revolutionize the way buyers obtain data. Tealbook leverages machine learning and AI to provide transparency, agility and insight to the supply chain e-procurement ecosystem.
The startup maintains a significant presence in Cincinnati. Tim Schigel, Refinery’s managing partner, told me Tealbook has seven employees based in the state, who had worked out of Fueled Collective pre-pandemic, with about 50 employees overall.
Tealbook, he said, is one of the hottest companies in supply chain and the latest round is a testament to the company’s potential for hyper-growth. Tealbook’s customers include Fortune 100 companies across multiple sectors.
"We all know that better data equals better outcomes, but too often enterprises rolling out new applications find that the projects stall or fail because of low-quality data," Schigel told me. "It's a big problem and a huge market opportunity. [Tealbook’s] founder and CEO Stephany Lapierre really knows the industry and had the right intuition about the direction of the market.
"The added catalyst of growth was Covid," Schigel added. "It was a major disruptive event in the market and Tealbook was the perfect solution. Customers were lining up out of the door. As a result, Tealbook attracted a large amount of investor interest."
Tealbook, to date, has raised over $22 million. Schigel said the raise should spur growth in the Cincinnati market specifically, and the company is hiring marketing, sales and alliance roles.
