One of Nashville's longtime parking giants has gone high-tech in the last year or so, first by using a platform created by Metropolis Technologies Inc. and then agreeing to be acquired by that company in March. Now, Metropolis — which tagged Nashville as its second headquarters and is backing that up with hiring and investment — has banked a nine-figure round of investment to propel growth in the face of a rocky economy.
Company name: Metropolis Technologies Inc.
What they do: Automated drive-in, drive-out payment at 600 parking lots and garages in 60 cities nationwide, using a tech platform that uses cameras and artificial intelligence to track a driver's arrival and departure and automatically bill for the exact time stayed.
Amount raised: $167 million, in a Series B raise. Company spokesman Corey Owens declined to disclose Metropolis' new valuation following that round. The raise is almost triple the total amount the company had corralled since starting in 2017.
Why it matters: Metropolis acquired Nashville-based Premier Parking in March, folding that business into its own. Metropolis, which is based in Los Angeles, declared Nashville a co-headquarters and made former Premier CEO Ryan Hunt its new chief operations officer.
Then and now: "Nashville is, by order of magnitude, the most important market for us in the United States," Metropolis founder and CEO Alex Israel declared in March. Interviewed on June 14, Owens added: "We have every intention to double down on our commitment to Nashville. It's become clear pretty quickly that Nashville is an incredibly strong place for us to do business."
Chief investors: 3L Capital (offices in New York and Los Angeles) and Assembly Ventures (offices in Detroit, Berlin and Silicon Valley) co-led the round.
Other backers: Dragoneer Investment Group; Eldridge Industries; Silver Lake Waterman (which makes "flexibly structured investments in pre-IPO companies"); UP.Partners; Dan Doctoroff (CEO of Google's Sidewalk Labs and former deputy mayor of New York City); DivcoWest; Moving Capital; RXR Realty; Zigg Capital.
What the funds will be used for: "Jobs, full stop," Owens said. Metropolis has 200 open roles companywide, 120 of which are in Tennessee — and the majority of those are in Nashville. They range from "front-line mobility specialists" who service kiosks and charging stations to a senior vice president role, product designers and a senior director of design and creative. "In short," Owens said, "there's no role at this company right now that we're not opening in Nashville first."
A new parking spot of its own: Metropolis is "rapidly outgrowing" its existing Nashville office at 144 Second Ave. N. and will need a larger space, Owens said.
Look ahead: Both a Metropolis press release and comments from Owens alluded to ways the company's looking to expand its premise and platform beyond parking. The company is working with grocery stores, coffee shops and other retailers. Electric vehicle charging stations and car washes could one day use the same technology, Owens said. "Parking is the first and obvious use case. It is not the last," he said. "As we expand into new verticals, we expect Nashville to be home to those deployments."
