The San Francisco based AI-driven talent management startup ‘Sense’ has raised a $16 Mn Series C round and also expanded its global footprint by doubling down on India operations.  This time the firm has been backed by India-based business-to-business (B2B) Avataar Ventures and once again its existing investors Accel & Google Ventures. 

Anil Dharni, a former investor himself and former Chief Operating Officer, GREE International realized the engagement gap among staffing firms, contractors and employers back when he was building his previous company and working with recruiters to hire for his own team. He identified the flaws in the existing communication and engagement methods. In an interview with People Matters, back in 2019, he had shared his observation - how most recruiters are working with piecemeal point solutions, manually handling their interactions with potentially hundreds of contractors, each at different phases of their employment cycle. 

Anil took it upon himself to free recruiters and employers from these efficiencies and launched Sense. Ever since its launch the focus for the tech startup has been to provide a hassle-free system of engagement for talent acquisition teams. 

In a previous interaction Anil Dharni, CEO and Co-founder of Sense had shared, “Despite how fast the contingent workforce is growing and how much value the cohort represents for the $461 Bn staffing industry, there is little to no interaction between the staffing firm and contractor, or insight into what drives a contractor’s engagement on the job.”

Sense has more than 400 customers across the globe including Amazon and Kelly Services. The tech startup has been expanding globally with customers already in Australia, Canada, and the UK. But they never planned to stop there. 

Now as it further expands its global footprints and doubles down India operations, it also strengthens its leadership team. Sanjay Dharmani, ex-InMobi has been appointed to lead Sense India as Managing Director and Nishant Rao, founder of Avataar Venture Partners also joined the board.

India will be regional HQ for Sense’s broader Asia expansion

“We see India as a highly strategic market for us. The tech talent in Indian is very robust and knowledgeable in SaaS solutions. This global expansion allows us to tap into that rich talent market to grow our product and engineering team as well as a dedicated marketing and customer success team, said Anill. 

Eventually, India will serve as their regional HQ for broader Asia expansion which itself holds a $110 billion market potential. 

As we witness a macro-shift in the contingent labour and gig economy, Sense has a good opportunity to build upon. While the overall Work tech space is growing rapidly across the globe, the recruitment tech space, in particular, seems to form the maximum share of it. Candidate engagement, in particular, has gained a lot of popularity in recent times and has become the top priority for companies. Many startups like Zoho Recruit, GetApp and BreezyHR are also helping staffing firms and companies engage better with candidates.

For its next phase of growth and to stay ahead of the curve in a highly competitive HR tech space, Sense would have to continuously invest in deep expertise in recruiting and AI technology and keep on innovating its solution.