Design platform InVision acquires Australian startup Trunk

New York-based design platform InVision has acquired Australian startup Trunk for an undisclosed fee.

Founded by Elliott Risby and Chris Berry, Trunk has been described as ‘GitHub for designers’, allowing design teams to easily manage their design files, collaborate, and solve the issue of file versioning.

Graduating from the Startmate accelerator early last year, Trunk has brought on users from companies including Uber, Dropbox, Twilio, and Accenture.

As part of the acquisition, the Trunk team will join InVision to work on its Studio and InVision Cloud products. The Trunk platform will, in turn, wind down within the next six months.

Clark Valberg, founder and CEO of InVision, said he is excited about the innovative experiences the Trunk team will bring to the future of the InVision platform, and the design industry as a whole.

“As every organization in the world faces the challenge of maturing their design teams, workflows and infrastructure for better outcomes, more and more of the patterns common to the world of engineering are becoming relevant to design as well,” he said.

The acquisition follows Trunk last year applying for an investment from InVision’s US$5 million Design Forward Fund, which provides grants and investments to individuals and companies creating tools and resources that can change the game for designers.

After getting to know the Trunk team better, however, InVision “knew they would be a great addition to the Studio family”.

Elsewhere in startupland, Seek has acquired graduate jobs platform GradConnection for undisclosed fee.

Kendra Banks, Seek’s Australia and New Zealand managing director, told The Australian Financial Review that the goal of the acquisition is to get jobseekers using one of Seek’s services early on and keep them within its environment through their careers.