Pisano Raises US$2.5M to Fuel Further Growth

October 16, 2020

This Quarter saw Alacrity Turkey company Pisano secure another US$2.5M in external investment, coming from lead investor Elevator Ventures (EV). The partnership with EV goes back to 2018, when Pisano management met a team from Elevator Ventures parent company RBI, one of the largest banks in Central and Eastern Europe, at an event in London England. A subsequent product demo was a catalyst for Pisano being accepted into the EV FinTech Partnership Program known as Elevator Lab.

Under that program, Pisano successfully completed several Proof-of-Concept (PoC) projects with RBI bank branches in Bulgaria and Kosovo and used the experiences to tailor their customer engagement solutions for the specific needs of the region. This led to discussions with EV about them taking a lead-investor position in an upcoming funding round, and fast-forward to today, the companies enjoy the solid relationship they have.

EV is now both a customer and an investor. This enables them to bring market knowledge and  experience to  the table as well as funds. Pisano values both, believing strongly that the most successful companies are those who are closest to their customers. This is something they have practiced in the past as well, partnering with Vestel Ventures as investors in 2018 after having the parent company Vestel as a customer for several years.

In terms of applying the new funding, Pisano has the following priorities moving forward:

  1. Expand customer community: An ambitious digital community program called Pisano Academy has now been launched to encourage current and prospective customers, influencers and partners to share experiences, best practices and other information about the field of customer and employee experience management. This program is designed to foster a collaborative environment that generates a growing set of relevant content.
  2. Evolve current products: Pisano software is already relied on by thousands of users in more than 20 countries across Europe, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific. Much of this use is centered on managing the engagements and experiences of customers. As a result of COVID-19, however, several clients are also using the tool to manage the experiences of their employees. This represents a growth opportunity for Pisano, and they are watching closely to determine the best new functionality to serve these unique needs. This will include leveraging AI and machine learning technologies which are already incorporated into the product to detect spam, categorize data, predict or infer customer sentiment, power more effective reports and more.
  3. ŽDetermine added ways for customers to listen, respond, sell: The company is also working on new ways to empower their customers to listen, respond and sell. Capabilities to leverage emerging social media channels and plug-and-play third-party channels are being developed, as are more advanced capabilities around Chatbots and other technologies.

Pisano realizes the health and stability of the company is as important to their customers as it is to their employees, investors and partners. It is a responsibility management takes seriously, and this new funding makes the company stronger than ever. Particularly in times as challenging as we have all seen recently. The commitment remains to listen to customer needs, innovate, work hard and continue on a path of growth. They are very grateful for the continued investor support. pisano.co/en