Brisbane-founded Skedulo raises US$28 million Series B round led by M12

Brisbane-founded, San Francisco-based mobile workforce management startup Skedulo has raised $40 million (US$28 million) in a Series B round led by Microsoft’s venture capital arm M12, with participation from existing backers Blackbird Ventures and Costanoa Ventures.

Skedulo is the second Australian-founded startup to receive funding from M12 this week, following fellow Brisbane company GO1’s raise of $30 million. Priya Saiprasad, principal of M12, will join the company’s board in hand with the funding.

Cofounded by Matt Fairhurst and James Davies in 2013, Skedulo helps organisations schedule jobs in the field and enable communication between schedulers and mobile workers. Its platform automates and optimises the scheduling of jobs, matching available and qualified employees to customers “within the context of the company’s priorities”.

Among its customers are the American Red Cross, Vision Australia, and USA Football.

With the Series B bringing the total raised by the company to date to $57 million (US$40.5 million), the funding will go towards growing the company’s global team. Sixty staff will be hired for its Brisbane and Sydney offices.

Fairhurst, CEO of Skedulo, said the company is focused on helping companies overcome the challenges of managing their deskless workforce.

This is an increasingly complex problem that impacts billions of mobile workers across millions of enterprises worldwide. It’s a problem that Skedulo is committed to addressing at scale – something no other solution provider has ever done,” he said.

“We’re inspired every day by our customers who use Skedulo to engage with their workforce in new and innovative ways, from managing schedules to driving productivity.”

Saiprasad said M12 is excited to support the Skedulo team in its efforts.

“Skedulo makes it easier than ever for modern businesses to manage a mobile workforce, providing customers the tools and resources needed to empower their employees on the go,” she said.

The market is growing: over 2.7 billion workers worldwide, or 80 percent of the total global workforce, are deskless. In turn, the mobile workforce management category is predicted to reach US$9 billion in revenue by the end of 2022.

“The way people work is changing and enterprises that capitalize on these changes through modern platforms like Skedulo will be best positioned to compete and lean into rapidly changing customer and employee expectations,” Fairhurst said.

Image: Matt Fairhurst. Source: Supplied.