In one of the largest fundraises for a WA tech startup in 2021, Michael Momsen‘s Zipline (formerly known as RateIt) has closed a $6 million Series A2 round led by EVP and supported by King River Capital.
In mid-2019, RateIt raised US$5M from Singaporean investors including Tin Men Capital, a B2B technology-focussed venture capital firm.
The new company Zipline has grown by more than 300% over the past year, with more than $5 million annual recurring revenue (ARR).
The $6M funds will be used to accelerate Zipline’s growth, especially in Australia’s hospital network, increase its headcount from 40 to 80 and prepare for a US launch in early 2022.
The move also establishes Zipline as a multi-product company, with the Zipline product covering compliance management in conjunction with RateIt (the company’s original in-the-moment feedback solution) and the recent acquisition of employee pulse software 6Q.
Organic and growth by acquisition
Michael Momsen founded the business after leaving Microsoft to help organisations create awesome customer experiences.
One of the top challenges healthcare executives face is, “Are we compliant as people come into our places?” which is further complicated by requiring things like flu vaccination and people being fever-free for example.
Zipline is a software and kiosk platform that automates in-person compliance. It offers providers a quick way to manage visitor, staff, volunteer and contractor compliance.
For aged care, Zipline ensures that the visitor has a valid flu vaccination and that they’re fever-free. For hospitals, it ensures staff, contractors and visitors have a valid COVID vaccination and police clearances.
Digitising this streamlines their operations to avoid queues and add extra staff.
It also improves customer experience, ensuring consumers can easily book a maternity ward or aged care facility tour online with the compliance elements built in.
Since its inception, Zipline has seen rapid Australian uptake with St Vincent’s, Regis, Estia, Brightwater, Respect and Calvary as clients.
“Aside from automatic compliance, one of the things we love [about Zipline] is the powerful reporting. We can see clear trends in visitations. This allows us to provide extra care and support for those who will benefit the most,” said Prue Densley, Executive General Manager at St Vincent’s.
Zipline’s CEO & Founder Michael Momsen said the startup was tapping into a huge market.
“The demand for automating in-person compliance is here to stay. Organisations were already looking into this space, the pandemic has simply made these issues more critical to solve now,” said Michael.
As a practical example, hospitals or schools can’t have an air-con guy walking around without a police clearance. We also know many healthcare providers who want people to have the Varicella vaccine before coming on site. Our tech is solving these evolving compliance requirements, which is a problem felt world over.
Michael Momsen
“At a time where many are drowning in compliance admin, it’s a pleasure to be building solutions that free up our customers to do what they do best — be it patient care or customer service.
“I’m proud to have an A-grade team of Zipliners with me, as well as the support of EVP and King River Capital. Our motto through the pandemic has been ‘Be fast, be secure, be easy and be awesome to work with’, and this wouldn’t be possible without their commitment to our vision.
This growth and the company’s focus cemented EVP’s interest in investing.
“Compliance management is a new category that clearly has some significant tailwinds as a result of the pandemic,” said Justin Lipman, Partner at EVP.
“Watching the Zipline solution spin out of an existing software platform [RateIt] in the midst of global upheaval was inspiring. We were particularly impressed by the team’s ability to solve problems quickly and secure rapid customer adoption.
“Having watched Michael assemble the current team over the last four years, the investment case became self-evident. Not only is he a stellar operator and founder, but he’s attracted some of Australia’s best technology and startup minds. It is rare to find an early stage enterprise software business with such momentum.”
Zebediah Rice, Co-Founder and Partner at King River Capital, agrees.
“We’re thrilled to be part of the Zipline journey in building the next generation of automated compliance software,” he said. “Michael has created one of the best product teams we’ve ever worked with. They’re poised to make this industry-wide adoption seamless and we can’t wait to see what’s next for the business. We look forward to supporting them as they expand into the US market.”
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For more, go to https://zipline.io/
