Investment firm Vista Equity Partners agreed yesterday to acquire a majority stake in Pipedrive, a US-based customer management software provider backed by telecommunications firm Deutsche Telekom.
The deal will value Pipedrive at $1.5bn according to Tech.eu, and DTCP, the investment manager spun off by telecommunications firm Deutsche Telekom, is among the shareholders that will retain a stake in the company.
Founded in Estonia, Pipedrive has created a customer relationship management platform used by some 95,000 sales teams. Its chatbots and web forms generate sales leads for users who can track contact, call and email histories with each customer.
DTCP’s Venture/Growth Fund invested $10m in the company in late 2018 to help it close a $60m series C round that already included Insight Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, Atomico and Rembrandt Venture Partners at a valuation just over $300m.
The series C round brought Pipedrive’s overall funding past $90m and all the participants will still be minority investors once the Vista deal closes. Its earlier funding had come from Atomico, Bessemer Venture Partners and Rembrandt Venture Partners in addition to Paua Ventures and AngelPad.
Raj Sabhlok, Pipedrive’s chief executive, said: “Our goal is to successfully deliver on the bold vision that Pipedrive set earlier this year – to provide our users with powerful tools that cover the whole customer journey.
“This means developing a holistic set of products for various customer-facing teams – from helping marketers find leads, supporting sales teams to close deals, to serving customers success professionals to upsell and nurture relationships.”
