US-based customer service platform developer SmarterHQ has raised $13m in a round backed by Simon Venture Group, the corporate venturing unit owned by property developer Simon Property Group.
Private equity firm Spring Lake Equity led the round, which included venture capital firm Battery Ventures.
SmarterHQ has built a personalisation engine that helps retail marketing teams respond to customer behaviour in real time. It will use the cash to grow its sales and marketing capabilities as it looks to expand into industries such as financial services and travel.
J. Skyler Fernandes, managing director of Simon Venture Group, said: “Our continued support of SmarterHQ stems from testimonials we receive from the retail brands we work with looking to create a robust omni-marketing strategy and a 360-degree view of their customer.
“With SmarterHQ, retailers are driving more revenue in one day than they could with a full month’s worth of non-personalised messages. The [return-on-investment] is quite impressive and is the result of their advanced machine learning capabilities.”
The round increased SmarterHQ’s overall financing to $33.6m, it said in a statement. Simon Venture Group led the company’s $8m series B round in mid-2015, to which Battery Ventures also contributed.