Emissary, the US-based business intelligence platform developer backed by media company The New York Times and internet technology group Alphabet, launched its service on Monday with $10m of new funding.
The $10m series A round was co-led by venture capital firms Canaan Partners and G20 Ventures, and comes after The New York Times, VC firm Nextview Ventures and GV, a corporate venturing vehicle for Alphabet, supplied $2m in seed funding.
Emissary has built an online platform that connects sales teams to more than 5,000 former executives who can provide them with valuable insights into organisations for which they have worked.
The company’s founder and CEO is David Hammer, formerly a product manager at Alphabet subsidiary Google. He said: “At Google I came to realise that we all have valuable, tacit knowledge that was not available online.
“With Emissary, we are using technology to gain access to relationship-driven knowledge from trusted sources that can often make the difference between whether or not you close a deal.”