Belgium-based Cikisi raises €2.7M to expand its market intelligence tool

Belgium-based Cikisi announced it had raised €2.7M in a pre-Series A round of funding. 

The company says the funding will accelerate Cikisi’s growth and extend its market reach within the next two years.

Angelwise, a Belgian ICT & SaaS early-stage investment fund, led the pre-series A round. Brussels’ regional investment company finance&invest.brussels and a new renowned Business Angel with a relevant SaaS track record participated in the round along  with the founders, and existing Business Angels and investment funds, Investsud and Sambrinvest.

Automating workflows

Since 2016, Cikisi has developed a competitive tool that automates the entire workflow of a market intelligence department, from data collection and enrichment to analysis and distribution to stakeholders. The tool also features robust search and index capabilities, semantic text analysis, and a massive database of 1 billion documents that is continuously updated.

Cikisi now has over €1M in annual recurring revenue. Notable companies such as SOLVAY, SAINT-GOBAIN, ATOS, KPMG, and PWC are among its clients. The company claims it continuously helps service and industrial companies gain a competitive advantage by providing timely information on threats and opportunities. 

Cikisi currently works with petrochemicals, energy, glassware, construction, agri-food, and automotive sector clients. Meanwhile, banking and insurance, human resources, security and defence, transportation, medicine and health are on its list of clients in the service sectors. 

Plans for growth

In June 2021, Cikisi raised a Seed round of funding to fine-tune their B2B SaaS market intelligence solution for large international industrial and service companies. During this round, the company successfully attracted good traction and a competitive advantage with its cutting-edge technologies and user-friendly interface.

Moving forward, Cikisi aims to be profitable at an operating level or EBITDA positive by the end of 2024. It also plans to raise Series A funding in 2025.

“Our main objective over the next two years is to accelerate our growth, exploiting new sales channels and new geographical territories,” says Valery Mainjot, CEO and co-founder of Cikisi. “We will continue to target European markets outside of Belgium, where we already generate 70 per cent of our sales and where we will develop a local commercial presence.”

Franck Di Liberto, Sales Manager and co-founder of Cikisi, says that the company would be opening an office in Brussels before the end of the year. He adds that with the new financial resources, Cikisi is one step ahead of transitioning from a market challenger to a market leader.

Support from partners

Marc Mommaerts, managing partner of Angelwise, expressed the company’s support in helping Cikisi to become the leading market intelligence tool. The company was impressed by Cikisi’s customer traction, proven track record, product, and operational excellence. 

“We believe Cikisi is ready to quickly expand further into Europe. By investing and joining the board, I will bring our network and strategic SaaS expertise to the table,” says Mommaerts.

Pierre Hermant, CEO of finance&invest.brussels, says that Cikisi’s solution is becoming increasingly relevant these days, as confirmed by trends in the data processing market. As the company continues to scale up and attract a large clientele, he believes that Cikisi’s arrival in Brussels will create jobs and boost the region’s international influence.