HourlyNerd, an online marketplace for freelance business talent, has raised USD7.8 million in Series B funding, led by Highland Capital Partners.
Other participants include GE Ventures, Greylock Partners, Intuit founder Scott Cook, the Kraft Group, angel investor Semil Shah, former Etsy CEO Maria Thomas, Rent the Runway Founder/CEO Jennifer Hyman and Boston VC Suffolk Equity Partners.
This new round of funding comes just 11 months after HourlyNerd announced its Series A financing round, led by Highland Capital Partners and Greylock Partners, and just 15 months after announcing a seed funding round led by billionaire angel investor, Mark Cuban. HourlyNerd will use the financing to continue expanding upon its market-leading technology platform.
“This financing serves as further proof that our disruptive model is working – delivering incredible freelance talent directly to businesses in a flexible, unbundled, technology-driven way. I’m particularly excited at the life we can provide for incredibly talented folks who for family or personal reasons prefer to work as independent freelancers,” says co-CEO and co-founder Rob Biederman. “We are increasingly seeing consulting firms both buying and selling projects on our site, as their demand and capacity fluctuate. HourlyNerd is becoming the global spot market for business talent,” he added.
“This signifies a material milestone for HourlyNerd. Serious investments into our product are now paying off as we have a leading marketplace with incredible automation that relies on data from thousands of projects. We’re thrilled to take this next step as we work to provide an experience for enterprises that is just as exceptional as what we’re now offering SMBs,” says co-CEO and co-founder Pat Petitti.
"Over the past year we’ve been overwhelmed by demand from enterprises under-served by existing options for flexible, elite business expertise. Gone are the days of having to choose between the excessively bundled incumbent players and nothing; chances are very good that HourlyNerd has just the right expert in our network of nearly 10,000. We're thrilled to be partnering with world-class venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and one of the world's most respected enterprises in our next phase of growth," says co-founder and CFO Peter Maglathlin.
Founded two years ago in a Harvard Business School Field III Course classroom, the founders came up with “HourlyNerd”, the idea of linking small businesses, with MBA students and business school graduates. HourlyNerd placed 2nd of 150 companies in the HBS “IPO Day” competition in May 2013.
In just two short years, HourlyNerd has grown to accommodate more than 4,500 companies, using over 10,000 consultants from top consulting firms, investment banks, and business schools around the world, including Harvard, Wharton, Stanford, Columbia, Tuck and Kellogg. By pairing businesses with premier quality professionals, at reasonable rates, and on an “as needed” basis, HourlyNerd is able to serve the entire spectrum of American commerce. HourlyNerd’s clientele ranges from Main Street businesses to the strategy groups of Fortune 10 companies, including GE, Microsoft, American Apparel and Omaha Steaks.
