London based Plentific, which operates a marketplace SaaS platform targeting the property management space, has closed a $100 million Series C. The funding round is led by new investors Highland Europe and Brookfield Technology Partners — the VC arm of the eponymous real estate giant — along with Mubadala Investment Company and RXR Digital Ventures, as well as existing investors A/O PropTech and Target Global.

The 2013-founded startup provides a cloud platform for landlords, property and facilities managers, and service providers — taking aim at legacy software with a joined up digital marketplace for locating tradespeople, managing repairs, keeping tenants informed and generating analytics to support data-driven property service delivery. 

Live in the UK, Germany and the US, it says the new financing will go on significantly growing its presence in the US as well as further global expansion. Its total equity raised to date with this latest round is $140M.

Plentific says it intends to spend on accelerating its engineering and product development to further fire up digitalisation across the property and facilities management space — with a plan to integrate Internet of Things (IoT) into its platform and also build out asset management solutions.

It’s also eying baking in machine learning and AI to help commercial and residential landlords increase returns and “make smarter decisions”, per its pitch.

Series C funds will also go on beefing up its offer for service provider — such as by increasing its CRM (Customer Relationship Management) functionality so it can better position itself to pull in contractors of all sizes.

The home improvement trend that boomed during the pandemic lockdown certainly seems to have been very positive for Plentific’s business: Per its website, 350,000+ properties are now managed by the platform across its three (current) markets.

The startup also told TechCrunch it has 100+ “large clients”, at this stage, and more than 16,000 contractors on its marketplace. While the number of properties Plentific has under management has grown 17-fold in the last three years, per a spokeswoman.

Plentific targets its property management tools broadly, at a range of customers and sectors, from private landlords and those running short term lets; to those responsible for managing social housing or student accommodation; and to property managers in sectors like education, hospitality, sport/fitness and social care. (So — unlike startups like Mashroom, which are trying to disrupt the traditional managed service letting agency model — it doesn’t play in the lettings side of the market and would instead be hoping to win such agencies as customers for its tools.)

Commenting on the Series C in a statement, Cem Savas, CEO and co-founder of Plentific, said: “We had a phenomenal year of growth, more than doubling headcount to almost 200 employees, opening an office in the United States and cementing our position in the UK and German markets. Our next step is to rapidly expand in the US, as well as look to begin operating in new geographies. We have only just scratched the surface of a $2.5 trillion potential market opportunity. We will now be rapidly expanding both our global footprint and the solutions we offer to become the de facto digital partner for landlords and service providers across the world.”

In another supporting statement, Josh Raffaelli, managing partner at Brookfield, added: “We are thrilled to partner with Plentific as it seeks to fully digitize the repairs and maintenance process. As one of the world’s largest real estate owner, operator and investor we have first-hand knowledge of how lowering operating costs can help drive efficiencies. We look forward to leveraging that knowledge and experience to help fuel Plentific’s growth and expand its global footprint.”

Another growing area of focus Plentific flags is supporting customers to expand their Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) credentials — saying it will expand capabilities in this “critical area”. Here it works with clients through its PropertyLab accelerator program which it says aims to develop solutions to strengthen ESG initiatives and make reporting more robust through enhanced analytics, in addition to trying to tackle the carbon footprint of properties.

Source: TechCrunch

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