Brazen is about to close $4 million in funding to help satisfy the needs of a corporate world in desperate need of talent to hire. The real-time messaging and collaboration platform is getting half of the money in a Series B round from previous investors led by Osage Venture Partners, but has also made a deal with a bank to provide another $2 million.
"We're really just building out the platform we currently have," Brazen founder Ryan Healy told DC Inno in an interview. "From a product point of view we have a lot coming up in the near future like the release of our API."
The API will add a whole slew of new clients integrating Brazen's software into their talent hunt. That client list is already at four figures, mostly companies with more than 1,000 employees, including more than 100 universities.
"We're building out our customer base ," Healy said. "We've been really successful in the healthcare and tech industry and in the consulting industry. There's a lot of traction in education too. We've recently we've signed on a lot of [clients] in the K-12 education space]."
The clients subscribe to the software to use for one or two years at a time. The model was originally designed specifically to help organizations find new talent, the software is flexible enough that customers are able to use it for other purposes, like fundraising. It's a format usable for groups that aren't talking to each other every day, with an angle beyond what messaging services like Slack focus on, especially when it comes to finding potential hires for companies.
The need for talent applies to Brazen too. Healy said the company is hiring across the board to keep up with the current and expected rise in client numbers. Brazen operates globally, though the majority of its clients are in the U.S. The scope for adding new clients in other countries naturally expands with the new investment though, and Healy speculated that there is a lot of opportunity out there for Brazen.
"There's a talent shortage in all the industries of our clients," Healy said. "Tech and the other core industries need to find and connect with that talent. That's where we come in.
