Norwegian startup Whereby, a collaboration tool for easy video meetings, has announced that it has raised $12M (approx €10M) in a fresh round of funding from Point Nine, Jason M. Lemkin’s SaaStr fund, and a group of more than 20 angel investors – including founders of companies like Miro, Typeform and GoCardless, founding members of Spotify
Use of the capital
The proceeds from the current round will enable Whereby to fuel its continued growth, expand its team, and further develop products that make meetings easier and better for everyone.
Point Nine is an early-stage venture capital firm focused on B2B SaaS and online marketplaces. Since its inception in 2011, the firm has invested in more than 140 startups in more than 30 countries.
Christoph Janz, partner at Point Nine, says, “Last year we saw the mass adoption of video meetings. Now it’s about taking the user experience to the next level…It’s amazing to see a Scandinavian startup playing in the same league as the tech giants.”
Everything about Whereby
Formerly known as appear.in, Whereby was co-founded by Ingrid Odegaard and Svein Willassenin in 2013. The company provides an in-house built proprietary video infrastructure as a go-to meetings tool to businesses and agencies globally.
The company’s users can choose their own personalised URL and meet over their browser, mobile, or desktop. Its tool offers built-in features like screen and audio sharing, session recording, branded rooms, and customisable room links so that users get the most of their video meetings.
Online whiteboards
The company also provides whiteboard integrations like Miro, Trello, and Google Docs to enable remote teams the same levels of creativity and collaboration they’d experience if they were all in the same room.
Online whiteboards are software solutions that come along as apps or browser-based tools. They support teams can collaborate visually via remote access in real-time. Each participant of a meeting logs in to the same online whiteboard space and can add his/her content, while all the others see what he/she is doing in real-time and can interact if needed with all the content.
Whereby believes this freedom helps reduce unnecessary travel, creating a cleaner, greener world. They recently cemented their commitment to being a sustainable company by planting 1 million trees across protected sites in Kenya, Mozambique, and Madagascar, an area equivalent to 137 football pitches.
The future of work?
According to research by the Harvard Business Review, almost all workers (96 per cent) say they need a flexible workplace, but only 47 per cent get the flexibility they need. And Whereby is on a mission to give people the freedom to work and live where they thrive. Since its inception, the company’s goal is to provide meaningful connections for 1 billion people by 2024.
“The past year has led many of us to question the future of work, with video meetings set to remain a big part of our lives,” says Øyvind Reed, CEO at Whereby.
“More than ever, the tools we use to connect have to enable effective and enjoyable meetings, providing focus, collaboration, and wellbeing. Having attracted some of the world’s best investors, we’re excited to keep working on bringing better meetings to teams around the globe,” adds Reed.
In 2020, the company saw a 450 per cent increase in users across 150 countries as millions of people relied on its browser-based service and slick design to connect and collaborate.
According to Whereby’s website, its team is spread across 12 locations, who work side by side every day no matter where they live.
Whereby offers a free plan for every-day conferences, plus the option to upgrade to the Pro plan for $9.99 per month, giving access to 1 user, 1 meeting room, and up to 50 participants on each call. And, for growing businesses, its plan starts at $14.99 per month with unlimited users and one team room included.
