Executive search platform SucceedSmart announced a $6 million funding round; other rounds were announced by Meaningful Gigs and Wedge. Additionally, Prosperix this week announced a new vendor management system for the contingent workforce.
SucceedSmart
A $6 million seed funding round was announced by SucceedSmart, an executive search platform founded by Sanjay Sathe, who also founded RiseSmart, an outplacement platform acquired by Randstad for $100 million in 2015. The funding round for Los Altos, California-based SucceedSmart was led by Storm Ventures.
“The traditional executive search market, which has dominated executive hiring for decades, is extremely transactional, exclusionary and clubby by nature,” Sathe said. “Not only is the pricing exorbitant, but in most cases, corporations pay the majority of the fees up front, regardless of whether the traditional executive search firm even places a candidate.”
SucceedSmart uses artificial intelligence to match member executives with leadership positions, enabling hiring managers to reach out directly to the executives with opportunities. Once an executive decides to “like back,” their complete profile is unlocked and shared with the hiring managers. Executives who are members of SucceedSmart’s platform choose between a $10,000 success bonus, a $10,000 donation to the charity of their choice or 100 days of executive coaching once they gain employment through the platform.
Client companies pay a flat $40,000 success fee only when a director-level executive or above is hired through the platform along with a software-as-a-service fee of $500 per month for each user.
Meaningful Gigs
Meaningful Gigs, a talent platform connecting clients to freelance designers in Africa, announced a $6 million seed funding round, TechCrunch reported. Meaningful Gigs was started in 2018 by CEO Ronnie Kwesi Coleman, COO Stephanie Nachemja-Bunton and CTO Max Farago.
“The three of us have been friends for the last 10 years and we are part of the same creative community,” Coleman told TechCrunch. “One day, we came across this startling statistic that said by 2050 the number of young people that will be entering the workforce in Africa would be more than all the young people entering the workforce in the rest of the world. And we thought this was crazy. It hit us that we could build a business around this. And personally, it resonated with me because I grew up in Ghana.”
The seed round was led by Stage 2 Capital with participation by several others.
Wedge
Wedge, a provider of a one-way video interview platform based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, announced a $2 million funding round.
Taking part in the round were Michigan Capital Network, Michigan Rise and Northgate Holdings, among others.
Two executives will join Wedge’s board as a result of the round: Dale Grogan, managing partner at Michigan Capital Network, and Rocki Howard, chief people and equity officer for The Mom Project.
Prosperix
Prosperix announced a new contingent workforce VMS this week. Prosperix CEO Sunil Bagai said the VMS uses network, matching and human intelligence to enhance contingent workforce management.
Prosperix VMS’ AI uses several parameters to match open job requisitions to most suitable suppliers.
San Jose, California-based Prosperix formerly operated as Crowdstaffing. The company changed its name about a year ago.
VP of operations at Prosperix is Scott Giroux, who had formerly served as VP – North America staffing at Volt Information Sciences Inc.