The last year has been about clearing hurdles for Denver-based startup CometChat.
The company has grown to over 50,000 customers, expanded its product capabilities to serve one million concurrent connections and, now, brought on a significant amount of capital to fuel its next moves.
CometChat on Tuesday announced an oversubscribed $10 million Series A funding round led by Signal Peak Ventures and including participation from existing investors Matchstick Ventures, Range Ventures, Unbound VC and others. The company previously raised $1.6 million in seed financing in September 2020 from Range Ventures, Silicon Badia and iSeed Ventures.
CometChat, which was incorporated in the U.S. in 2019 by twin brothers Anuj Garg and Anant Garg, works with companies to provide communication products to improve user engagement.
The company’s platform provides text, chat, voice and video functionality for website and apps across a variety of industries. The solution is not a live customer support chat, but rather a communication tool for marketplaces, dating apps or communities that want their users to interact with each other.
The company was bootstrapped until 2019, when it took part in the Techstars Boulder Accelerator Program.
Since its founding, Anuj said he has been cautious with fundraising, only bringing on capital when needed and not just for notoriety. With this $10 million round, CometChat was most excited about bringing on a team of local investors and having the freedom to make bigger bets on its product.
“As a company, fundraising is not the goal, in my mind,” Anuj said.
With three of its four primary investors located in the Rocky Mountain region, and Matchstick and Range in Colorado, CometChat prioritized local investors in this round.
“The community in Colorado has given us so much, they’ve supported us and welcomed us with connections, capital and mentoring,” Anuj said, adding that he chose this group of investors to repay that faith.
The Series A funding will help accelerate the company’s growth, enhance its platform and grow its team, both in Denver and in India. In total, the company has about 80 employees, with the majority of those on the development team based in Mumbai. Anuj expects the global team to double in the next year.
CometChat currently has 12 employees in Denver, including Dan Mitzner, the company’s recently hired chief marketing officer. Mitzner joined the team having previously served in marketing executive roles at Denver-based SendGrid.
This round will allow CometChat’s staff to work with no constraints as they build out the product, Anuj said.
“We don’t need the money, but we could use the money,” he said. “That’s the difference.”
