WATI, a Hong Kong-based SaaS startup that provides customer and sales engagement tools, announced that it raised $23 million in a Series B funding round to scale the team and product and reach more businesses globally.

The round was led by Tiger Global, with participation from existing investors Sequoia Capital India & Southeast Asia, as well as new investors DST Global Partners and Shopify. 

Ken Yeung, co-founder and CEO of WATI, said: “The business messaging market has grown enormously. Meta estimates that around a billion people per week communicate with a business or service account across WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram. This insight is critical for what’s happening now and what’s coming ahead. About 40% of Meta’s advertisers globally - over 4 million businesses - use click-to-message ads, which redirect people from Facebook or Instagram into one of Meta’s messaging products to chat with a business. WATI is well placed to service this demand and beyond.”

With additional funding, WATI will continually scale the team and invest in the product stack for low-code automation, encouraging wider adoption of digital tools. WATI plans aggressive go-to-market plans in emerging markets, such as Latin America and Southeast Asia.

WATI enables companies to have scalable yet personalized conversations with easy-to-use customer engagement software built on WhatsApp's Business API.

Company: Clare.AI Limited

Raised: $23.0M

Round: Series B

Funding Month: October 2022

Lead Investors: Tiger Global

Additional Investors: Sequoia Capital India & Southeast Asia, DST Global Partners, and Shopify

Company Website: https://www.wati.io/

Software Category: Customer Engagement Software

About the Company: Founded in 2020 by Bianca Ho and Ken Yeung, WATI ('WhatsApp Team Inbox') is a comprehensive customer communication platform for WhatsApp. WATI helps companies have personalized conversations with customers at scale with easy-to-use customer engagement software that is built on WhatApp's Business API. Through the WATI platform, SMBs can send personalized notifications from their system in a programmatic way through WATI's API. WATI's remote-first team has increased by fifty percent, attracting leaders from Twitter and Freshworks. WATI has approximately 6000 clients in 78 countries, including SMBs, who provide domestic house cleaning services to schools, tutorial centers, medical facilities, e-commerce, and Shopify stores. Its vision is to help businesses meet their customers where they are – on these messaging platforms – so they are always accessible, personalized, and can engage in real-time. WATI is headquartered in Hong Kong.

Source: https://newsdirect.com/news/wati-raises-23m-series-b-funding-round-powering-whatsapp-for-businesses-543195244