Insider asked dozens of top VCs from firms like Sequoia Capital, Insight Partners, and Greylock to name the most promising enterprise startups that they think will soar in 2021, both inside and outside their portfolios.
From their nominations, we created a list of the most impressive venture-backed firms, organized alphabetically, that are taking on the $4 trillion a year business-to-business tech market.
We included estimates of their total funding according to deal database PitchBook, unless otherwise specified.
These 76 companies are some of the most promising startups in enterprise software, according to VCs:
What it does: A.team has created a network of freelance developers, product managers, marketers and other "builders" and connects them with companies seeking new products and features.
Why it is on the list: In a remote-work era, A.team's social platform allows freelancers to keep independent schedules, while allowing companies to build expert teams regardless of location.
"COVID tailwinds have accelerated A.Team's growth," Vogelstein said, "But the remote work trends A.Team capitalizes on are here to stay."
What it does: Airbyte's open source platform helps companies move the data they collect to cloud-based data "lakes" and warehouses, where it can more easily be used or analyzed, like by an artificial intelligence system.
"As modern data infrastructures are being reshaped with the emergence of Snowflake and Databricks, we see the reimagining of the data pipeline happening across our portfolio," Kumar said.
Alloy: security compliance for banks and fintechs
Kais Khimji is a partner at Sequoia.
Courtesy of Kais Khimji
What it does: Alloy helps financial firms collect data to verify customers' identities and onboard them faster. It keeps bad actors out of the financial system.
"The number of identity and verification data sources will only continue to explode," Khimji said. "Alloy is becoming the single pane of glass to manage these data sources and customize 'Know Your Customer' workflows to onboard any given customer segment quickly and safely."
Bedrock Ocean: mapping the ocean floor with robotics
What it does: Bedrock Ocean uses robotic submarines to map the ocean floor. The startup has been compared to "SpaceX for the ocean" because of its pioneering work in the deep blue.
Why it's on the list: The information that the company is collecting from the ocean floor has a number of applications, but one of the most critical is planning for offshore wind farms, where windmills are stood up in bodies of water to generate clean energy, Svrluga said.
"This team, with backgrounds ranging from naval architecture to SpaceX, is building transformational technology that will enable gathering the essential data for building offshore wind at a fraction of the price — a major climate priority of the Biden administration," he said.
Blues Wireless: hardware that makes the 'Internet of Things' dead simple for developers
What it does: Blues Wireless makes the 'Internet of Things' easy by selling an embeddable device that bakes cellular connectivity into hardware products, allowing them to become "smart."
Why it is on the list: Serial founder Ray Ozzie started the company in 2018, after previously creating Lotus Notes, Groove Networks, and Talko, and serving as Microsoft's chief software architect. The company raised over $22.1 million in its Series A and is already seeing traction after its latest December 2020 product launch.
"We are already seeing large companies move to production," Vernal said.
Census: helping businesses put all their stored data to use
What it does: Census helps companies send all the data they have stored in the cloud to different parts of their organizations, like sales, marketing, and business development.
Why it is on the list: By helping customers extract data from the cloud into other services and tools, Census aims to simplify analysis and, ultimately, drive business decisions.
"While a lot of effort has gone into moving data into these warehouses, the same hasn't gone into moving it out to business operations teams to analyze," Robby said. "That's where Census comes in: They form a new layer that helps companies extract new value from their data in cloud warehouses."
Chooch: computer vision for the workplace
E. Bora Uygun, cofounder of Bora & Sons.
E. Bora Uygun
What it does: Chooch is an artificial intelligence company that provides visual recognition tools – AI that "sees" and recognizes objects – to help companies build applications for the likes of flagging product defects, medical mistakes, or safety hazards.
Why it is on the list: Chooch says it has trained its AI programs to accurately match "human visual expertise" and work across many different use cases.
"Chooch's unique and broad platform automates much of the workflow required to generate accurate computer vision models," Uygun said.
ClickUp: a single app for all collaboration
Bryan Rosenblatt, principal at Craft Ventures.
Craft Ventures
What it does: ClickUp combines its own collaboration and productivity tools with integrations with Slack, Google Docs, Zoom, and more, allowing teams to work together in one app.
Why it is on the list: Remote work requires easy team collaboration. ClickUp advertises itself as the "one app that will replace them all," making it a potential competitor to other suites like Microsoft Office. It has already hooked companies like Uber, Netflix, and Airbnb.
"With the emergence of distributed teams, it's likely that collaboration will not only be the biggest category in SaaS but also the most fundamental to the way we work," Rosenblatt said.
Cockroach Labs: software for managing cloud databases
Jake Seid is the managing director at Stone Bridge Ventures.
Courtesy of Jake Seid
Why it's on the list: "Pretty simple: The world is moving to the cloud and Cockroach made a cloud-scale SQL database," Seid said. "Simple to say but very, very hard to do."
The startup took in $160 million in new funding in January from investors including Altimeter Capital, GV, Benchmark, Index Ventures, and Tiger Global in January, doubling its valuation to $2 billion.
Coda: a new take on Microsoft Office
Arif Janmohamed, Lightspeed Venture Partners.
Arif Janmohamed
Recommended by: Arif Janmohamed, Lightspeed Venture Partners
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $240 million
What it does: Coda pulls documents, spreadsheets, and lists together into one feature-rich format that allows teams to work together and have all their information in one place.
Why it's on the list: Founded by former YouTube engineer Shishir Mehrotra, Coda claims to be the modern alternative to Microsoft Office and Google Workspace. Companies like Uber, Spotify, Robinhood, and Square have all started using the all-in-one productivity app and the startup is now valued at over $1.4 billion.
"Shishir Mehrotra is an amazing founder who once ran YouTube engineering," Janmohamed said. "He's assembled an amazing team to build a slick and modern product."
What it does: Common Room shows companies where and how customers are discussing them online (like through forums or on social media), and helps those firms learn and engage.
Why it's on the list:Common Room's community-based approach to customer engagement has already gotten the attention of clients like Clubhouse, Confluent, and Notion and led to a recent $32.3 million Series B funding round led by Greylock.
"Common Room is a great example of how new software tools need to be created to help companies," Chen said. "The amount of interest in the short amount of time is truly impressive."
What it does: Commsor helps companies' community managers, marketers, and user experience pros collect feedback and see how customers are using their products on apps like Twitter, Slack, and Discourse through application programming interfaces (APIs).
Why it's on the list: "It seems the key to every customer and enterprise business is a vibrant community," Patel said. "Commsor is building the right software at the right time: when communities are the front and center for every business."
Commsor is currently targeting business-to-business companies and recently completed a $16 million Series A, with a valuation of around $100 million.
What it does: Coursedog is a software startup that wants to make it easier for universities to better schedule classes, assign professors, and more based on demand and interest.
Why it's on the list: Most universities still do curriculum planning using PDFs and Excel files. Coursedog gives schools a more modern way to resource plan, while giving students a better way to sign up for courses.
"Selling into the educational sector has been notoriously difficult, but Coursedog's solution has such a clear value proposition," Achadjian said.
Cresta: artificial intelligence for call centers
Jake Seid is the managing director at Stone Bridge Ventures.
Courtesy of Jake Seid
What it does: Cresta makes artificial intelligence-powered software that helps customer service and sales agents boost productivity and improve their interactions with potential and existing clients.
Why it's on the list: Its founders include two Stanford PhD dropouts — sound familiar? — and a robotics and computer science legend. Zayd Enam and Tim Shi studied under Sebastian Thrun, who developed the technology for Google's self-driving car.
As AI has gotten more advanced, more uses for it are opening up, according to Khimji: "We're entering a golden age for conversational AI, and the contact center is the ideal application for it."
Cribl: tools for organizing data
Derek Zanutto is a general partner at CapitalG.
CapitalG
What it does: Cribl provides tools for companies to organize their data and route it to the proper places for storage or analysis.
Why it's on the list: Cribl is operating in a booming field: a segment known as data observability.
Plus, its founders — Clint Sharp, Dritan Bitincka, and Ledion Bitincka — have ample industry cred. The three previously worked together at Splunk, a Big Data company that is now publicly listed. "The tailwinds for growth in the observability space are immense," Zanutto said. "Cribl is one of the most exciting enterprise software companies we have seen."
Deel: an HR service for global workforces
Itamar Novick is a founder and partner at Recursive Ventures.
Courtesy of Itamar Novick
What it does: Deel aims to make payroll and compliance easier for companies with employees in different countries.
Why it's on the list: The past year has shown that location isn't all that important for many businesses, which have opted to let employees work remotely even after the pandemic. That is, until it comes down to details like taxes and local laws.
Deel strives to alleviate the potential headache of those issues for companies that are expanding internationally, which Solimine told Insider he expects to see pick up in the next few years. Novick, an investor in Deel, concurs: "COVID-19 was a significant catalyst, but the distributed work movement has just begun, and Deel is in the driver's seat."
Dexterity: automating factory work
Grace Chou, Felicis Ventures.
Courtesy of Grace Chou
What it does: Dexterity is building intelligent robots that can pick up objects and pack boxes for logistics and warehousing companies, which would allow employees to focus on higher-level tasks.
Why it's on the list: The automation startup raised a $56.2 million Series A led by Kleiner Perkins last summer, demonstrating the growth workflow automation has as an industry.
"COVID has accelerated the pace of adoption for industrial robotics and automation, and Dexterity has reinvented every aspect of the robotic stack and doesn't rely on particular technology," Chou said. The company has "phenomenal speed of deployment and commercial traction" to boot, she added.
What it does: Ethena gives employees mandatory compliance training in easily digestible "nudges," rather than in long, tedious videos at the beginning of employment or annually.
Why it's on the list: Founders Roxanne Petraeus and Anne Solmssen originally founded Ethena in 2020 to renovate sexual harassment training for startups. The company has since expanded its course load and signed contracts with companies such as Netflix, Zoom, and Zendesk.
Petraeus and Solmssen "took a category in desperate need of renovation – sexual harassment training – and built a company with enormous momentum that I think will become the compliance operating system of the future," Dunn said.
Why it's on the list: The security space has accelerated in the past year, as remote work revealed a host of cybersecurity vulnerabilities for midsize businesses. Exabeam has capitalized on this growth, recently completing a $200 million Series F at a $2.4 billion valuation.
"Unlike many other sectors, the security space has had strong tailwinds resulting from COVID and transitioning to remote workforces," Gouw said. "Exabeam quickly accelerated their transition to a cloud-delivered, software-as-a-service model."
Flatfile: automatically organizing and cleaning up data
What it does: Flatfile speeds up the process of adopting new software by helping companies round up and import data into a new tool, like HubSpot or Salesforce, and then clean it up, too.
Why it's on the list: Many companies are suffering from data overload and adopting new tools to help manage it. Flatfile, which raised a $35 million Series A in March 2021, seeks to simplify the onboarding of that data, so that firms can start seeing results.
"Flatfile solves a seemingly simple problem that's hard to automate," Chen said. "Data is so essential for businesses in 2021."
Gatheround: virtual events for the remote workforce
What it does: Built for a remote world, Gatheround's app brings coworkers together online through team building activities, happy hours, weekly reflections, all-hands meetings, and more.
Why it's on the list: The workforce will never be the same even after offices reopen, which is why more companies are using Gatheround to build culture and strengthen teams online.
"In an era of Zoom and other video-based collaboration, Gatheround built up a loyal customer base that's held over half a million conversations on the platform," Cham said.
Grain: a free tool that records and organizes Zoom meetings
What it does: Grain helps enterprises record, transcribe, edit, and share clipped video from Zoom meetings in real-time.
Why it's on the list: Described as the cure for "Zoom amnesia," Grain allows teams to star key meeting moments and embed the videos directly into Slack, Notion, and other work tools.
"Grain captures and repackages the critical moments that happen in video meetings, making it easier to share this content in the most efficient and powerful way with those who need it," Lefcourt said.
What it does: Grow helps companies gather feedback from customers and employees through customizable templates that can be integrated into popular work tools.
Why it's on the list: Grow aims to simplify feedback and communication in the era of remote work. The feedback platform offers integration with popular work tools like Slack, Google Calendar, and Namely.
"In the Zoom and Slack era, there's a major new challenge: it is difficult to give feedback," Dunn said. "Grow is aiming to solve that problem with a Slack-based product that gamifies feedback."
What it does: Hopin is an online events platform that helps companies organize and manage virtual conferences.
Why it's on the list: The pandemic made London-based Hopin a rising star in Europe, as live events sought to make the most of virtual conferencing. The company recently announced that it raised a $450 million Series D round. That funding pushes its valuation to $7.75 billion, according to PitchBook.
"We believe that virtual events will persist far beyond the end of the pandemic," Wilhelm said. "The team is stellar."
What it does: InfluxData helps developers capture and analyze the vast volumes of data — including from connected, "smart" devices — so companies can track trends over time.
Why it's on the list: InfluxData has hooked some of the biggest names in technology as its customers, including Cisco, IBM, PayPal and Tesla. The company is led by CEO Evan Kaplan, a veteran of the data-management space for over 20 years.
"For the last few years, the company has been the fastest-growing company in the fastest-growing database category," Thakker said.
What it does: Instrumental helps companies automate assembly-line processes with artificial intelligence software that can detect problems like factory defects.
Why it's on the list: Instrumental was founded by Anna-Katrina Shedletsky, a former Apple lead product design manager and engineer. The startup claims to provide a solution for waste and inefficiency in the $40 trillion manufacturing industry.
"Prior to COVID-19, companies always sent many team members to their manufacturing partners on a continuous basis as they prepared products for mass production," Uzzaman said. "Now these same companies can use Instrumental to accomplish the same objective without needing to send their employees on frequent international trips."
Klir Corporation: helping water utility companies track compliance regulations
What it does: Klir software helps water utility companies track and monitor operations and comply with water-regulation laws in their region.
Why it's on the list: Water utility management needs an upgrade, according to Straub. Klir is one of the first Cleantech firms to allow utility companies to track both local and national regulations when it comes to water management, she said.
"We are turning a corner as it relates to climate change, and we are seeing this in the data from Klir," Straub said. "More and more water utilities are excited about moving off legacy systems."
What it does: Knowde is a digital marketplace for connecting chemical producers to buyers. There are over 100,000 products listed, with vendors selling everything from polymers to cosmetics to food ingredients.
Why it's on the list: Despite being a $565 billion business, the US chemical industry is "highly fragmented and un-digitized," Wilhelm says. And if any startup can unify the it, Wilhelm's betting on Knowde.
"Knowde reads like a marketplace but underneath the slick front-end is a deeply sophisticated database, data extraction, and data indexing work of art," she said.
Laskie: a freelancer hiring platform specializing in sales and content
TNT Ventures founding partner Matthew Tillman.
TNT Ventures
What it does: Laskie helps companies hire freelance employees in sales, website development, marketing, and content strategy.
Why it's on the list: Laskie cuts out the tedium of connecting freelancers and clients, Tillman said. It analyzes budget, project scale, and more to match firms with freelancers on its networking platform.
Laskie is founded by Chris Bakke, the former head of product at popular job searching platform Indeed.com, and has an "insanely good team with brilliant growth numbers," according to Tillman.
LaunchDarkly: giving developers real-time feature control
Andy McLoughlin, partner at Uncork Capital.
Uncork Capital
What it does: LaunchDarkly helps developers selectively launch new features to certain users and monitor the performance of newly-launched software in real-time.
Why it's on the list: Spanning 3 million servers and 14 million mobile devices and browsers, the company allows developers to roll-out, control, and flag features without disrupting their products overall.
"This is an incredibly special company," McLoughlin said. "The company came into 2021 with extremely strong growth, and has only accelerated thus far."
Lilt: translating company content into other languages
What it does: Lilt is an artificial intelligence-augmented translation platform for enterprises.
Why it's on the list: Lilt helps companies more easily reach an international audience by translating their content to other languages. It's hooked customers like Intel, Asics, and Canva, and the software can be applied to a wide range of sectors.
"The enterprise translation and localization market is massive, with tens of billions in annual spend," Frantz said. "Lilt's approach of augmenting human translators with machine translation tools dramatically improves service quality and speed."
Loom: short videos for work
Contrary Capital founder Eric Tarczynski.
Contrary Capital
What it does: Loom is a messaging app that lets users record short videos to get their ideas across instead of typing long emails or spending time in meetings.
Why it's on the list: Loom has taken off since the pandemic began as more people reach for tools that help them get work done remotely. It has more than 10 million users at 120,000 companies including Netflix, Atlassian, and Procter & Gamble.
"It's an essential tool for remote teams and has experienced hockey-stick growth because of that," Tarczynski said.
Maven: online courses that build community
Li Jin is the founder and managing partner of Atelier Ventures.
Courtesy of Li Jin
What it does: Maven works with creators to build and offer cohort-based, online classes.
Why it's on the list: Maven capitalizes on two major trends: online learning and the creator economy. Powerhouse firm Andreessen Horowitz took notice, leading its $20 million Series A round.
Not only are big name VCs on Maven's cap table, but investors are embracing the platform as teachers as well. You can currently learn about crypto from bitcoin expert Anthony Pompliano or building a business from Sahil Lavingia, CEO of Gumroad.
"By making digitally-enabled peer-learning experiences more accessible for students and teachers alike, Maven is giving life to a new world of online learning," Jin said.
Meroxa: a real-time data service
Gabby Cazeau is a principal at Harlem Capital.
Harlem Capital
What it does: Meroxa's software allows companies to quickly and efficiently create data infrastructure.
Why it's on the list:Meroxa's website reassures users that it will handle "all the plumbing so you can worry about what matters." VCs are sold: The startup raised a $15 million Series A round in April, with investment from Drive Capital, Sequoia, Kleiner, and Index Ventures.
"Ultimately, developers want power, speed, and flexibility for their data infrastructure," Cazeau said. "Meroxa provides that and an exceptional user experience."
What it does: Mighty makes a web browser that lets people use the internet faster.
Why it's on the list: Mighty is a cloud-based web browser that claims to "make Chrome faster." It boasts that it uses 10 times less memory than Chrome, allowing users to keep more tabs open and run multiple heavy work apps like Figma or Airtable.
"Mighty is one of the most exciting tech companies to watch," Yin said. "Mighty has built a new browser that essentially throws more hardware at the problem, so that your web apps are blazingly fast. If they can dominate, they can become the central hub of everything a user does."
What it does: Molecula helps clients organize and prepare vast amounts of data so it can be processed by machine learning algorithms.
Why it's on the list: Headed by serial founder H.O. Maycotte, founder of RateGenius and FightLock (now Control Risks Group), Molecula come out of stealth in 2021 with the announcement of a $17.6 million Series A round.
Raczka said that the company will be a "fun one to watch, as they expand sales and marketing efforts."
Monograph: a payments service specifically for architects
What it does: Monograph builds cloud-based software for architecture firms to help them manage projects, track time-management, and handle invoices.
Why it's on the list: The three cofounders — Robert Yuen, Robert Dixon and Moe Amaya — all have experience in both architecture and software, and the company has helped manage over $125 million in projects.
"COVID has pulled forward the need for a digital-first collaboration tool for many industries, like architecture, dominated by pen and paper to date," Achadjian said.
The number of data pipelines that need monitoring is "growing rapidly," according to Redpoint's Chase, making a product like Monte Carlo more necessary than ever.
Moveworks: giving workers tech support through a chatbot
Arif Janmohamed, Lightspeed Venture Partners.
Arif Janmohamed
What it does: Moveworks makes an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot which integrates with Slack and provides automated answers and support for employees in industries such as IT, finance, and HR.
Why it's on the list: The startup recently raised over $200 million in Series C funding and it's used by some of Silicon Valley's biggest companies, including LinkedIn, Docusign, and Broadcom.
It's "actually using AI to resolve problems and drive outcomes," Janmohamed said.
Mural: an online canvas for project planning
Nikhil Sachdev is a managing director at Insight Partners.
Nikhil Sachdev
What it does: Mural makes an online canvas – essentially a digital white board with apps – that allows teams to collaborate remotely on project brainstorming, design planning, and task management.
Why it's on the list: The pandemic has accelerated Mural's growth. The San Francisco-based startup announced in July that it raised a $50 million Series C round, pushing the company's valuation to $2 billion.
Mural has "applicability across all types of enterprise," Sachdev said, and "applicability across all personas within an enterprise."
Natural Capital Exchange: a carbon offset marketplace
What it does: Natural Capital Exchange uses AI and satellite imagery to identify, measure, map, and catalog trees to estimate the impact of environmental programs on forests.
Why it's on the list:Major companies like Salesforce have pledged to reduce their carbon footprint and Natural Capital Exchange helps corporations quantifiably measure their offsets.
"We're seeing some of the world's biggest companies pledge to offset their carbon footprint," Gamble said, and the firm is "enabling this to happen."
OpenPhone: add a 'business phone' to an existing device
What it does: OpenPhone is an app that allows employees to easily add a work phone line and other features to their mobile device, while keeping data separate and secure.
Why it's on the list:With a $14 million Series A, OpenPhone wants to bring the business phone back in style. The app allows employees to separate personal from business on one device.
"Today, workers either carry two phones, or commingle their work and personal data on a single device," Vernal said. "OpenPhone gives you a business phone on your personal phone."
Orca Security: a security platform that covers cloud-based assets
What it does: Orca Security's platform automatically scans companies' public cloud accounts for cybersecurity threats without accessing any private information.
Why it's on the list: As more companies move to the cloud, businesses face persistent security threats, making a reliable cloud-based security platform all the more urgent.
Orca Security reached unicorn valuation in March with a $210 million Series C, pushing its valuation to $1.2 billion. The cloud security firm has clients such as Robinhood, Databricks, and Unity.
"Orca has built a fundamentally new approach to cloud security," Frantz said, "That cannot be achieved with other cloud security tools available on the market."
Overstory: using satellite imagery to chart forest data
Katie Jacobs Stanton, founder and general partner of Moxxie Ventures.
Amanda Aude, Shutter Pine Photography
What it does: Overstory uses satellite imagery to give utility companies and forestry organizations data on forested land. The idea is to use that data to help its clients prevent wildfires and power outages.
Why it is on the list: "The most existential problem we have is the deleterious effects of climate change," Stanton said. "Overstory offers real-time vegetation intelligence, at scale."
Oyster: an international HR platform
David Thacker, Greylock Partners.
Greylock Partners
What it does: Oyster helps companies onboard new employees, track benefits, and comply with payroll data regulations.
Why it's on the list: Oyster's biggest draw is its international onboarding that manages HR, compliance, and payroll for global firms. The company completed a $20 million Series A round in March led by Emergence Capital, which has backed enterprise mainstays like Zoom and Salesforce.
"Companies will want to hire the best talent no matter where in the world this talent lives," Thacker said. "The Oyster platform takes all the complexity out of hiring full-time employees or contracts in international markets."
Pano: computer vision for wildfire management
Katie Jacobs Stanton, founder and general partner of Moxxie Ventures.
Amanda Aude, Shutter Pine Photography
What it does: Pano uses computer vision — a form of artificial intelligence — to detect early signs of a wildfire, and predict its potential size and spread.
Why it's on the list: "Pano makes it easier for utilities to earlier detect and respond to forest fires, using AI," Stanton said.
Papaya Global: helping hire, manage, and pay international workforces
What it does: Papaya Global helps companies hire, onboard, and pay their global workforce while meeting various compliance regulations.
Why it's on the list: Papaya Global has customers in over 140 countries, and recently picked up $100 million in funding, pushing its valuation to $1 billion.
"The market for US payroll is vast and the market for global payroll, especially including payments, is multiples" beyond that, Wilhelm said.
Pento: automating payroll for small-to-medium businesses
Founder and managing partner at Avid Ventures
Addie Lerner
What it does: Pento is a cloud-based platform that automates payroll for small and medium-sized businesses.
Why it's on the list: Pento offers payroll automation while connecting to — and partnering with — many HR platforms. Some of its biggest partnerships include BambooHR and Quickbooks.
"As the number of innovative HR products on the market continues to grow in 2021 and beyond, Pento's value proposition" will grow, too, Lerner said.
Persona: aspiring to be the "identity layer of the internet"
Will Kohler, Lightspeed Venture Partners.
Courtesy of Will Kohler
Recommended by: Will Kohler, Lightspeed Venture Partners
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: More than $67.5 million
What it does: Persona is an all-in-one identity infrastructure company that helps businesses of all sizes securely collect, verify, manage, and make decisions about customers' identities.
Why it's on the list: In the last year, the company raised $50 million and increased its customer base by more than five times, adding clients like Square, Robinhood, Udemy, Gusto, BlockFi, and AngelList.
"Fast-growing businesses across many sectors have a delightful experience while deploying identity solutions across numerous use cases," Kohler said. "You don't hear this often."
Postman: a collaboration platform for API development
Recommended by: Dharmesh Thakker, Battery Ventures; Shardul Shah, Index Ventures
Relationship: No financial interest; No financial interest
Total funding: $208 million
What it does: Postman makes a software platform that helps teams collaborate when they are developing application programming interfaces — the mechanisms that connect different apps, called APIs.
Why it's on the list: A free-to-use product, the platform has drawn a crowd of non-technical users and over 15 million sign-ups across 500,000 companies, including Shopify, AMC, Imgur, Okta, Cisco and Inuit.
"The company has been able to attract this robust community due to software developers' affinity for the product to address all needs related to API management," Thakker said.
What it does: Reprise helps companies create interactive demonstrations of their software through a no-code platform, making it perfect for sales and marketing teams.
Why it's on the list: Reprise makes it easy for marketing teams to build engaging customer demos. The company raised a $17 million Series A in July.
"The company has created a solution to help its clients overcome a major problem in the digitally-led, inbound go-to-market motion — the customer demo," York said.
What it does: Retool is a low-code product for building internal software tools quickly.
Why it's on the list: Last fall, the company cinched a $1 billion valuation less than four years after its founding, thanks to rising interest in developer tools for non-technical people.
"As an ex-engineer, building and maintaining internal tools is like going to the dentist: Everyone knows they have to do it, but they want it to be as quick and painless as possible," Chase said. "Retool helps engineers to build internal tools fast, which frees them up to work on 'the fun stuff.'"
Sanity: building digital experiences
Josh Stein, Threshold Ventures.
Courtesy of Josh Stein
What it does: Sanity is a content management platform that helps creators, designers, and developers come together and collaborate easily.
Why it's on the list: Sanity is already used by National Geographic, Figma and Nike and "goes beyond the traditional CMS and allows you to build modern digital experiences," according to Green.
Securiti: ensuring data privacy compliance
Mayfield Fund partner Navin Chaddha.
Mayfield Fund
What it does: Securiti helps companies with privacy, security, and data governance by using automation to gather and organize customer data.
Why it's on the list: Securiti launched in 2019 and has raised over $81 million in funding. The security analytics startup manages data-privacy regulations for companies, offering security templates for different privacy regulations.
"Data and cloud are driving the new world," Chaddha said. Exponential growth of data brings on massive opportunities, but also massive risks, the investor believes, and Securiti helps protect firms.
Smartex AI: a textile inspector
E. Bora Uygun, cofounder of Bora & Sons.
E. Bora Uygun
What it does: Smartex.ai uses camera systems and computer vision — a form of artificial intelligence — to monitor and flag issues in textile production.
Why it's on the list: Smartex.ai is trying to automate inspection.
"The textile industry has an amazing opportunity to digitize the inspection processes and bring technology to replace the pen and paper process, increase yield, reduce waste, and become more environmentally friendly," Uygun said. "Smartex provides that."
What it does: Snappy is a gifting platform that helps companies host campaigns, drives, and manage one-to-one gifts between employees or with customers.
Why it's on the list: As companies reconsider how they approach a healthy workplace, Snappy helps reward and recognize customers, partners, and employees.
"The company has more than 1,000 customers across multiple industries, including Microsoft, Uber, Comcast and Zoom, and revenue increased 8-fold in 2020," Li said.
What it does:Snyk helps identify security vulnerabilities for developers who are working on open source code. Its tools automatically scan open source software to flag potential issues.
Why it's on the list: "Snyk has done a good job building awareness and users in the developer community," said Gouw.
What it does: StackShare's platform clearly lays the different pieces of software companies use to run their operations and why, so they can more clearly understand their own tech stacks. It also lets firms publicly list their technology choices, too, allowing companies to learn from each other.
Why it's on the list: The company has nearly one million developers in its community, according to York.
"As teams – notably engineering – become more distributed, it's critical that a platform exists to uncover what tools and technology are adopted across apps and infrastructure," York said.
What it does: Stedi automates business-to-business interactions by providing a self-service mailbox that connects partners in a commercial transaction.
Why it's on the list: Stedi has investments from top FinTech firm Stripe, one of its 11 current investors.
"The startup has an ambitious goal: help businesses save countless hours of menial tasks by processing every B2B transaction on the planet," Lefcourt said.
What it does: Stream helps big companies connect with customers by building chat and activity feeds into their applications.
Why it's on the list: The startup helps provide activity feeds for a wide variety of fields, such as healthcare, education, finance, and virtual events. Notable customers include TaskRabbit, NBC Sports, and Unilever.
"Chat is becoming the dominant medium for day-to-day communications," Luck said. With Stream's help, "teams go from concept to launch in a fraction of the time it would take to develop comparable functionality from scratch."
What it does: Streamlit's easy-to-use tools help companies build data analytics apps.
Why it's on the list: Streamlit seeks to make machine learning accessible to data scientists and its free software has been downloaded nearly two million times. Hundreds of companies — including 7-Eleven, Apple, Ford and Uber — use it.
"Streamlit's unique workflow is 10 times faster than other alternatives, making it possible for data scientists to go from idea to deployed app in only a few hours," Solomon said.
Strike Graph: automating data security compliance
Hope Cochran is a managing director at Madrona Venture Group.
Madrona Ventures
Recommended by: Hope Cochran, Madrona Venture Group
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $3.9 million
What it does: Strike Graph automatically walks customers through data security compliance requirements so enterprises can get federal certification.
Why it's on the list: "Strike Graph is just over a year old and is clearly addressing a need in the market: this important but onerous work of maintaining security certifications," Cochran said.
Stytch: a developer platform for user authentication
What it does: Stytch makes user-authentication tools to help developers build applications that don't require passwords.
Why it's on the list: Stytch's cofounders Reed McGinley-Stempel and Julianna Lamb have past experience working on security and authentication with the payment app Plaid. They completed a $20 million Series A round led by Thrive Capital in February 2021, sending the company's valuation from $25 million to $200 million in mere months.
"User authentication remains horribly fragmented in its implementations, leading to poor user experiences and behavior — which of course leads to identity theft and fraud," Kumar said.
SVT Robotics: bringing automation into warehouses and factories
What it does: SVT Robotics makes a platform that helps companies automate processes in the warehousing and manufacturing industries.
Why it's on the list: "The past year has put massive pressure on ecommerce fulfillment, as consumers have adopted online shopping en masse," Robby said. "SVT provides the necessary layer that can quickly bring robots online."
Swarm Technologies: wireless internet at a low price
Celestine "Cee Cee" Schnugg is the sole general partner of Bloom Capital.
Boom Capital
What it does: Swarm Technologies provides internet connectivity at a low price point through satellite network communications.
Why it's on the list: The most notable feature of Swarm Technologies is its price point: Last year the company announced the prices for its satellite communications products at $5 per device a month.
Schnugg compares the firm's satellites to the "size of a grilled cheese sandwich."
Syndio: an HR analytics platform that identifies pay discrepancy
Josh Stein, Threshold Ventures.
Courtesy of Josh Stein
What it does: Syndio makes an analytics platform that compiles employee salary data to identify discrepancies in pay.
Why it's on the list: Syndio aims to measure inequality in the workplace, identifying differences in pay tied to gender, race, ethnicity, or age. At the start of the year the company raised a $17 million Series B and serves big corporations like Salesforce, Slack, and Adobe.
"Syndio is an easy to use, data-driven platform that ensures fairness in the workplace — which every business needs," Stein said. "Syndio could become the essential diversity, equity and inclusion tool for every company, big and small."
Talkdesk: tools for remote customer service
Josh Stein, Threshold Ventures.
Courtesy of Josh Stein
Why it's on the list: Talkdesk, which has a big-name partnership with Salesforce, is currently pushing a $3 billion valuation.
More than "1,800 companies around the world" use Talkdesk, according to Stein, and its growth reflects how the pandemic permanently changed customer service.
Time by Ping: automatic timekeeping for lawyers
Alda Leu Dennis, general partner at Initialized Capital.
Initialized Capital
Recommended by: Alda Leu Dennis, Initialized Capital
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $17.2 million
What it does: Time by Ping makes data-analytics tools that use automation to track attorneys' billable hours.
Why it's on the list: Lawyers traditionally have to track their billable hours using pen and paper down to the fraction of the hour. A former lawyer, Dennis said that Time by Ping's product saves valuable time, making it an essential productivity tool.
"These knowledge-work industries, like the legal sector, have not improved upon their software in years," Dennis said. "This is why Ping's AI-powered timekeeping software has been crucial for its customers during the pandemic."
Traceable: protection from cyber attacks
Oren Yunger is an investor at GGV Capital.
GGV Capital
What it does: Traceable is a cybersecurity startup that searches applications' computer code for security issues, including via application programming interfaces, or APIs.
Why it's on the list: Traceable, which came out of stealth with $20 million in funding last year, is shutting down cybercrimes before they begin. It uses AI to study how computer code is supposed to work in apps and APIs, where they connect to other programs. When a hacker tries to break into a system, Traceable notes the disruption in the code and alerts the company.
"Traceable solves one of the biggest problem security teams face, which is distinguishing between valid and malicious use of an application's API," he said.
Transcend: a data privacy platform allowing users to view how apps are using their personal data
122 West Ventures co-founder AJ Solimine.
122 West Ventures
What it does: Transcend is a gives users more control over their data by making it easier for them to see how apps are using their personal data and downloading it.
Why it's on the list: With stories of data breaches becoming all too common, consumers are more worried about how their personal data is used. Transcend can help, Solimine said.
"They build data privacy infrastructure that empowers individuals to reclaim control of their data and helps companies comply with global data privacy laws," Solimine, the first investor, said.
What it does: Undock makes a Google Chrome extension that provides calendar tools to help corporate users schedule and coordinate meetings.
Why it's on the list: Undock is a newcomer to calendar management, hoping to take on bigger competitors like Calendly, Google Calendar, and Outlook. The startup raised a $1.6 seed round in 2020.
"As people start going to pre-pandemic schedules, managing your calendar will be very important," Ampadu said.
Vercel: an open-source front-end web development platform
What it does: Vercel helps developers to collaborate and deploy websites and other web services.
Why it's on the list: Vercel is the company behind popular open-source framework Next.js, used to build websites. Solomon referred to the framework as an "industry standard" for front-end web development that's "likely to propel Vercel for many years to come."
What it does: Vetro helps internet companies visualize and map their connectivity network.
Why it's on the list: "Vetro is disrupting the world of broadband infrastructure with the tools, technique and aesthetic of the 21st century," Raczka said.
Watershed: managing a company's carbon output
Katie Jacobs Stanton, founder and general partner of Moxxie Ventures.
Amanda Aude, Shutter Pine Photography
What it does: Watershed measures a company's carbon output and spits the numbers into data reports.
Why it's on the list: "Watershed is helping companies cut their carbon footprint," Stanton said. "The team built this solution at Stripe and have now scaled it to other tech companies including Square, Klarna and Shopify. We're going to need consumers, governments, and companies materially reducing their footprint and quickly."
Wiz: a cloud security platform businesses can understand
What it does: Wiz gives companies one place to view the security of all their cloud servers — "a single pane of glass" in cybersecurity industry parlance.
Why it's on the list: Wiz demonstrates that as more companies move to the cloud, it is important to secure not only customer data, but company data. "Wiz is the fastest growth company I've witnessed, driven by their relentless customer focus," Shah said, "We've seen cloud adoption accelerate tremendously throughout 2020, making the problem Wiz solves more critical than ever."
