Enterprise sales enablement platform Gong raised $250m in a Series E funding round valuing the company at $7.25bn, more than triple its previous valuation of $2.2bn last August.
The new round of funding, which brings its total amount raised to date to $584m, saw investors such as Franklin Templeton, with participation from Coatue, Salesforce Ventures, Sequoia, Thrive Capital and Tiger Global.
The new capital will be put toward product development, hiring and customer acquisition.
Gong aims to help companies boost their revenues. The platform works by recording sales representatives’ conversations with buyers – including emails, phone calls or video calls – and analysing those interactions to suggest ways they can improve and where they can be more persuasive during interactions with customers.
For example, Gong might identify if a sales rep needs to spend more time explaining the benefits of a particular product. It can also flag more specific items of interest, such as if mentioning a certain selling point increases or decreases the chances of a deal being made.
Gong’s patented Revenue Intelligence Platform also provides revenue forecasting capabilities. It analyses the data it collects from customer interactions and works out how likely each deal that’s still in process is likely to close in the seller’s favour. It also estimates when the deal might close. Furthermore, it flags potential issues that might reduce the seller’s likelihood of selling a specific product.
The company has over 2,000 customers across different sectors, said Bendov, including PayPal Holdings Inc, Microsoft-owned LinkedIn and Slack Technologies Inc, among others.
Gong, which has over 550 employees across the globe, said it had more than doubled its average rate of return in the first quarter of 2021 compared with the same period last year.
Gong CEO and co-founder Amit Bendov said, “Just as we predicted in 2015 when Gong began leveraging AI to understand the needs of customers, we experienced massive growth in the past year, proving revenue intelligence is a game-changer for companies.
“As professionals across the globe were forced to connect with customers remotely for the first time, they became even more reliant on data and insights to win the hearts and minds of their customers. Gong was no longer a luxury, but a necessity, and it’s become clear that our product, which makes recommendations based on reality, has the potential to change the way we all do business.”
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