Although office life is currently on hold across the country, some international companies still have their eyes set on U.S. expansion in order to grow in the future. One of these companies is iObeya.
iObeya is a French startup that creates digital workplace productivity software. On Thursday, the company announced that it raised $17 million in new funding, which it plans to use to open up a U.S. headquarters in the Seattle area.
The company has picked iObeya VP Tim McCracken to lead the U.S. team. McCracken is currently located in Bellevue and has been with the company for almost three years. He previously spent 16 years as a manager at Cisco. iObeya also recently hired Rick Tywoniak, who is also based in the United States, as its VP of marketing.
The Seattle-area office will open in late 2020 or early 2021 in Bellevue or Kirkland, according to GeekWire. Until then, the company’s U.S. employees will work remotely. The report also adds that the company is looking to hire 20 employees this year, and 50 over the next few years.
iObeya has seen a surge in demand since people started working remotely, increasing 400 percent since January. The company’s platform acts as a digital whiteboard, where coworkers can collaborate on tasks and incorporate lean and agile into their business processes. This type of software is especially useful for people who have to work together digitally, replacing traditional business strategy visualization methods like Post-It notes and whiteboards. More than 300,000 people around the world use the company’s offerings every day.
“Today’s workers know that advancing a unified vision and achieving common goals through teamwork — especially when working remotely — is essential. That’s why companies are striving to provide their employees with a human-centric, virtual environment in which they can innovate, grow, and contribute to the success of the business,” co-founder and CEO Cyril Daloz said in a statement. “We look forward to using this new investment to deliver a more visual and collaborative management approach, centered on human values, to large organizations as we expand our business in the U.S. and around the world.”
