Clickatell, the CPaaS innovator and Chat Commerce leader, today announces it has secured $91 million in their Series C round.
This round was led by Arrowroot Capital, with participation from Kennedy Lewis Investment Management, Endeavor Global and Harvest.
Clickatell, which has delivered double-digit profitable growth for several years, will use the Series C capital to scale and expand three key areas: (i) Accelerated development and innovation of its Chat Commerce offering, (ii) Expansion of its footprint in the U.S., and (iii) Scaling of sales and marketing efforts on the back of growing demand from leading brands.
Clickatell’s platform has been recognized as a global leader in powering mobile messaging / CPaaS (Communications Platform as a Service) and payments within chat. Clickatell processed more than 30 billion interactions, and 2 billion commerce transactions during the COVID-19 period alone as it enabled customer-centric brands to connect, interact and transact with their customers wherever they were sheltering in place during the pandemic.
Clickatell boasts an industry-first ability to combine communication and commerce in one comprehensive Chat Commerce proposition and introduced one of the world’s first chat banking solutions on WhatsApp, the world’s largest chat platform. Today, Clickatell is uniquely positioned to capitalize on the intersection between communications (CPaaS, CCaaS) and commerce (digital payments) - offering a complete end-to-end Chat Commerce Platform. Clickatell serves more than 10,000 customers, many of which are Fortune 500 companies and leading global brands such as Coca Cola, Deloitte, GT Bank, Booking.com, GoDaddy, IKEA, Novartis, Standard Bank, Tangerine, Telegram, US Foods, Visa, Zipcar, Capitec and others, providing them with a low / no-code, feature-rich Chat Commerce orchestration capability complete with assisted (chat desk) and unassisted (bots) chat and secure payments capability in its recently launched Chat 2 Pay offering.
“Chat Commerce is the future of digital commerce and engagement - it’s already happening at scale in markets such as China -- and soon every consumer in the US will engage family and friends via chat plus connect, interact and transact with the brands they love through their favorite Chat platform; and we are excited to be a leader in this digital engagement revolution,” said Pieter de Villiers, Co-Founder and CEO at Clickatell. “We believe brands want to avoid placing their customers on hold and it is becoming increasingly difficult for consumers to download their apps; Clickatell’s Chat Commerce platform enables brands to serve their customers where they are, in the chat platform they already use.”
With a massive $80+ billion Total Addressable Market (TAM), the Chat Commerce market is viewed as the third big wave of digital commerce, following the eCommerce and App Commerce markets. Chat is the largest digital platform in the world, with 7.7 billion users compared to 4.7 billion internet users, making it next to impossible for businesses to operate without communicating and transacting with consumers in chat channels. Chat Commerce enables businesses to easily facilitate significantly improved customer experiences through Chat, with the added benefit of being far more efficient for customers and operational costs.
“We have a shared vision with Clickatell that brands will need to invest in Chat Commerce to transform their customer experience,” said Matt J. Safaii, Founder and Managing Partner at Arrowroot Capital. “With 93% of conversations that transpire on its Chat Commerce Platform ending in a transaction, Clickatell is sure to continue to make waves in this growing sector. We’re delighted to support them on their way to becoming the category-defining, global leader in Chat Commerce.”
“Clickatell is an inspiring example of how a company from South Africa can pull the future forward. Clickatell was the pioneering company that successfully first sent messages from the internet to mobile phones, and today they power some of the biggest names in communications, like WhatsApp,” said Endeavor Catalyst Managing Director Allen Taylor. “With this new funding round, we are proud to partner with Pieter and the Clickatell team and work with them on what's next.”
*Gartner® has recognized Clickatell as a “Who’s Who in CPaaS Payments and How They Are Going About It” within their August 27, 2021 “Digital Payments as Part of Communications Platform as a Service Offering” report. Gartner stated, “Currently there are a limited number of CPaaS providers that provide the payment capability.” Additionally, the Gartner report predicts "by 2025, around 50% of CPaaS vendors will enable the functionality as part of their communications modules and offerings."