Brightpearl:
a short history
and key milestones
Founded 2007
University friends Andrew Mulvenna and Chris Tanner founded Lush Longboards in 1999. "Like most retailers, we hit challenges scaling the business," says Mulvenna. "Lacking a budget to buy an expensive business management system, we started to build our own." Eventually, they sold the skateboard company to concentrate on the system they developed.
2008-2010
By late 2009, the company had over 100 paying customers.
Brightpearl raised $24.5 million of private sector investment, across four rounds dating back to 2010. Brightpearl takes on its first outside investor, Eden Ventures. Eden was later joined by Notion Capital.
2011-2013
By late 2011, over 6,000 companies had signed up to Brightpearl's cloud-based business management platform. An angel funding round then was followed by a Series A transaction worth $5 million in 2011 and then a 2013 Series B deal bringing in $8 million.
2014
Notion Capital and Eden Ventures are joined by MMC Ventures as equity backers of Brightpearl. In the summer, Brightpearl raises $10 million in a funding round led by new investor MMC Ventures, alongside participation from Quayle Munro and existing investors Eden Ventures and Notion Capital. In addition, the business expands its international presence with the establishment of a US base of operations.
2014
Andrew Porter joins Brightpearl as the company's Chief Information Officer. After five successful years in the role, Andrew joined Brightpearl's board in July 2019. Andrew’s career spans over 20 years in market-leading investment banks and financial services companies including Deutsche Bank, UBS and Nomura.
2015
Fergus Gloster joins Brightpearl's board in May 2015 taking the position of Non Executive Director. Fergus is one of the foremost experts in Europe on building sales and marketing technology businesses. His career spans three decades and includes senior leadership roles at Oracle, Salesforce and Marketo.
2016
Brightpearl raises a $11 million series C round from Columbia Lake Partners, Eden Ventures, MMC Ventures, Notion Capital, Silicon Valley Bank and VentureFounders.
Derek O'Carroll joins as CEO of Brightpearl in May 2016. His drive, vision and leadership sees Brightpearl go from strength to strength, with significant growth in its core customer base, and he quickly helps cement the firm’s position as an invaluable asset for merchants seeking a competitive edge.
2017
Funding supports the accelerated growth of Brightpearl's US business, leading the company to triple its staff. In the spring, Brightpearl opens a new US Office in Austin, Texas, and expands its management team. Key staff that head up the Austin office includes Justin Press, SVP of Customer Success.
2018
Brightpearl creates buzz with the strategic appointment of Maurice Helfgott as Chairman, and raises a $15 million growth round led by Cipio Partners, who joined existing investors MMC Ventures and Notion Capital. As Founder of Amery Capital, an investment and advisory firm with a principal focus on retail and digital consumer businesses, the former Marks and Spencer main board director comes onboard with a sterling reputation for transforming the fortunes of consumer and fashion businesses, especially online.
Additionally, Brightpearl beats Microsoft, Adobe, LinkedIn and more household names in tech to scoop a top award as the best software company to work for in Britain, which is then reported on widely.
2019
Brightpearl wins a prestigious award as it takes home the honor of being the South West’s 'Business of the Year' for 2019.
2020
Brightpearl and Sage, a market leader in cloud business management solutions, announce a significant partnership. Under the partnership, Sage will make a minority investment of approximately $23 million into the business and take a seat on Brightpearl’s board.
Sage led the round investing approximately $23 million out of a total of $33 million raised in this Series C round, with existing shareholders including Cipio Partners, Notion Capital and Verdane investing the further $10 million.
Shopify selects Brightpearl to power its own lineup of Point of Sale hardware stores.
Square acquires order management system Stitch Labs which is sunsetted in June 2021. Square appoints Brightpearl in August 2020 as a preferred technology partner, onboarding 45 new businesses from Stitch Labs.
2021
Brightpearl picks up a prestigious Management Today award recognizing the turnaround in the company’s fortunes over the past four years after the business reports incredible growth in revenue and deal size.
In a hugely validating moment for the business, Brightpearl is selected by Shopify as one of only five global ERP vendors alongside global tech names, including Microsoft, Oracle, Infor, and Acumatica.
In the latter part of the year, Brightpearl acquires Inventory Planner, a popular market-leading demand planning tool that enables e-commerce retailers to predict demand and optimise inventory. With this acquisition, Brightpearl expands its technology offering to include advanced forecasting expertise.
2022
In January 2022, Brightpearl was acquired by Sage, officially becoming part of the Sage Group plc. The combination of Sage Intacct and Brightpearl create a powerful new solution for retailers and wholesalers.
In July, Brightpearl had a makeover, becoming known as ‘Brightpearl, by Sage’. The company continues to go from strength to strength while remaining fixed on its core mission: bringing innovative solutions that allow merchants to grow fearlessly.
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