![]() From that perspective, the investment arm of American Express said that Airbase was a “no-brainer,” given what Lim described as an intuitive interface that makes a sophisticated toolset simple to use. Lim said that before her team invests, it meets all players, centering its thinking around customer needs. According to the investor, innovation is speeding up, and with a goal of delivering the best set of products as possible in a “timely fashion” to its customers, partnering can be a way to reduce time to market.Īs to why Amex chose Airbase over a competing startup, it appears to have come down to what we might describe as software quality. Or, more simply, why the company doesn’t simply create its own version of Airbase software instead of working with an external provider that has a competing corporate card product. We asked Lim about how Amex decides to build, versus buy. So much so that other startups are looking to replicate it elsewhere in the world, TechCrunch has reported - and Amex doesn’t want something big that could be considered a potential direct competitor to wind up owning the future. That Amex is partnering with Airbase is notable, but not a huge surprise: The corporate credit giant also works with Concur, for example, and what Airbase and its competitors are building has obvious market resonance. Given the short period of time from that deal to today, it doesn’t seem too likely that Airbase was dramatically repriced by the deal. Airbase’s last known price tag was set at $600 million on a post-money basis after the company raised $60 million last year, according to Crunchbase data. ![]() From there, we presume, it will expand, provided that things commence smoothly.Īmex’s venture arm was loathe to detail much about its operations, including how it prices deals, so we aren’t clear precisely on how the new funds were valued in share-terms. In an interview, she told TechCrunch that the first phase of the tie-up will include a “select” group of customers to start. The Airbase-Amex deal will have a “crawl, walk, run” cadence, according to American Express Ventures’ managing director Margaret Lim. Divvy, in contrast, has had an SMB focus, traditionally. Kote, for example, said that “80%” of his company’s ARR now comes from “mid-market and early enterprise segments,” or customers with between 100 and 5,000 employees. ( TechCrunch’s Mary Ann Azevedo has more here.) Those numbers are why the corporate spend category is so investor-attractive - the sheer work of helping companies manage their spend is huge business, and one that is seeing increasing segmentation as it matures. Per the executive, Airbase’s annual recurring revenue (ARR) grew threefold in 2021, with payment volume rising eightfold in the same time period. TechCrunch spoke with Airbase CEO Thejo Kote about the deal, and his company’s recent progress. So, from our perspective of startup tracking, the news matters. ![]() The move by Amex to invest in and work with one of the competing startup players in the corporate spend market could provide a tailwind to the selected player, perhaps helping it scale more rapidly than its rivals. The corporate spend market is also a notable startup battleground, with Airbase competing with other well-known firms, including Brex ( which most recently raised $300 million), Ramp ( $200 million in its most recent round) and Divvy ( sold to for $2.5 billion). Normally we don’t cover announcements that lack hard figures like investment totals, but the Airbase deal is worth our time because the startup was willing to share a host of its own growth metrics. The deal also included a “strategic investment,” which TechCrunch reads as a modestly sized check, given that the dollar figure was not disclosed. This morning Airbase, a startup in the corporate spend space, announced that it is working with Amex on a pilot that will see its service offered to certain customers of the credit giant.
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