Chinese HR SaaS platform secures $80m Series C
Lightspeed Venture Partners and Sunshine Life Insurance have led a $80 million Series C round of funding for IfChange, a Chinese software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform that specializes in human resources management.
Lightspeed is participating alongside its local affiliate, Lightspeed China Partners, which has backed the company since its Series A round in 2014. It led the Series B in 2016 alongside Cathay Innovation, the venture capital arm of Cathay Capital Private Equity. Cathay Innovation has also re-upped for the latest round, which also includes a contribution from Schroder Adveq.
IfChange – also known as eCheng Technology – was established in 2013 by a team with previous experience working for the likes of Baidu, IBM, Microsoft, Tencent Holdings, and Hewlett-Packard. It claims to be the first Chinese company in the HR tech space to develop an algorithm that facilitates the application of artificial intelligence and big data technology to decision-making.
The platform provides a range of services, including applicant tracking, data entry, resume analysis, talent-to-position matching, and employee performance management. There are more than 4,000 paying corporate customers from the internet, real estate, financial services, automotive, and manufacturing industries. Alibaba Group, Tencent, and China Vanke are prominent users.
Youhong Zhou, IfChange’s founder and CEO, said in a statement posted by Lightspeed that the new capital will go towards the research and development of products and technologies, recruitment, and accelerating the commercialization process. The company’s goal is to provide a seamless, automated solution that covers the entire recruitment scenario.
“The digitization, intelligence and platformization of human capital is a big thing. There are many successful platform companies in this field overseas, but the China market is bigger and only just getting started,” said Herry Han, a partner with Lightspeed China.
Other players in this space include Beisen, which provides general and customized HR-related software as well as platform-as-a-service (PaaS) products that enable companies to outsource their whole HR management infrastructure. Last October, the company received over $100 million in Series E funding led by Matrix Partners China and Genesis Capital.
Elsewhere in the region, there has been a spate of investment in Australia-based workforce management start-ups. Within the past six months, the likes of Deputy, Humanforce, and M12 have all closed funding rounds, while Acendre Partners was acquired by Strattam Capital.
Lighthouse Capital served as exclusive financial advisor for IfChange’s Series C round.
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