California-based firm EquityBee has raised $55m from a Series B funding round led by venture capital firm Group 11.
Also taking part in the financing were Greenfield Partners, Battery Ventures, Altair, Icon and Local Globe. To date, EquityBee has raised $83m since its inception.
Launched in 2017, EquityBee connects startup builders with an investor community so the employees can obtain all the necessary capital to exercise their stock options and pay the taxes. This enables the employee to become a shareholder of the startup. Employees and the investors share a portion of any future exit gains. The company has locations in California and Tel-Aviv.
EquityBee co-founder and CEO Oren Barzilai said, “With so many exit events occurring, including acquisitions and SPACs, the startup equity system remains inequitable. We launched EquityBee to empower more employees to share in the success of the businesses they helped build. EquityBee will continue to provide them the tools required to better understand their earned options and the freedom to take part in augmenting their net-worth.”
Group 11 founding partner Dovi Frances added, “After leading EquityBee’s Seed and Series A rounds, we have witnessed the company’s continued triple-digit growth over the past year. The extraordinary founding team has demonstrated a great product-market fit, and their work continues to distance EquityBee as a true market leader.
“EquityBee’s industry-defining tech solutions will help millions of tech employees gain access to liquidity in a market otherwise set up against them. Our decision to scale our investment so soon after our previous round is an easy one, and we are pleased to continue supporting the company and its unprecedented growth.”
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