Workforce optimisation platform PINATA has announced that they have raised $10 million in a Series A investment round. The funding was led by M13 and Bullpen Capital along with participation from the company’s seed investors, Offline Ventures and Greylock partners.  

According to the company’s statement, the funding will further PINATA’s mission to “manage, measure, and maximize front-line workforces” by accelerating product development and creating new workflow offerings.

Rob Olson, Partner and Head of Strategy, M13 said, “PINATA’s unique approach is an antidote to a major shortcoming in today’s SaaS landscape. Rather than create another generic form- or workflow-builder that puts too much work on the customer, PINATA has built a truly innovative, hyper-flexible platform that allows them to tackle specialised applications. For the customer, that means out-of-the-box utility based on field-tested best practices. For PINATA itself, that means hyper-targeted customer acquisition, an ever-growing addressable market, and highly structured, one-of-a-kind data that will help to optimise the world’s work.”

The SaaS platform was founded in 2015 by Josh Wand and Ian Ferguson to singularly focus on workers/employees in the field. The platform acts as a ‘central command centre’ for large corporations, managing everyday operations in venues like retail stores, construction sites, warehouses, restaurants and trade shows. The platform offers a system of task-management solutions. 

“Front-line work is everywhere, and it’s mission-critical. But it’s also costly, logistically burdensome, and often entirely untrackable. The farther we get from HQ, the greater the risk of wasted time, energy, and resources for management and workers alike. With collaborative tools for goal setting, event planning, staffing, reporting, financial tracking, and data analysis, PINATA aims to bring benefits typically associated with digital execution — accountability, process automation, and above all ROI measurability — to the analog world,” said CEO Ian Ferguson.

The funding move comes at a time when the industry is amid talks of recession and inflation, risking the jobs of thousands in numbers. It would be interesting to see how the startup kickstarts its growth in the current volatile market.