Germany-based big-data analytics company Webdata Solutions secured €4m ($4.5m) yesterday in a series A round backed by Senovo, a human resources company focused on the IT sector.
Venture capital firm Seventure Partners led the round, which also included VC firm b-to-v Partners and the German state of Saxony’s early-stage VC fund, Technologiegründerfonds Sachsen (TGFS). TGFS previously provided an undisclosed amount of seed funding for Webdata in 2013.
Webdata has developed a service dubbed Blackbee that collects details on online retailers including pricing, trending products and product availability in real-time. Blackbee enables companies to keep tabs on competing stores and to adjust their own prices automatically.
Webdata, which was spun out of Leipzig University in 2012, will use the series A funding to expand into the UK, as well as to grow throughout Europe and to enter the US. Blackbee is currently available in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy and Turkey.
Carina Röllig, founder and chief executive of Webdata, said: “In future, this form of dynamic market analysis will be the only way to rise to the challenges of e-commerce and multi-channel retailing.
“Many retailers and manufacturers are finding themselves and their brands under increasing threat from pure play online companies. With Blackbee, they can turn that situation around.”