Contingent, the Supplier Insight platform, that makes procurement easy for businesses, just announced that it has completed an $8.2M funding round, led by Octopus Ventures, one of Europe’s largest and most active early-stage investors.
This funding round takes the total raised by Contingent to $11M, while also notably seeing participation from investors including Connect Ventures, Concentric, Seedcamp, Ascension, and Working Capital Innovation Fund.
The funding will be used to further build out Contingent’s suite of modular SaaS applications, with a particular focus on meeting the growing demand for more transparent and ethical supply chains.
Enterprise and regulatory concerns with procurement
Procurement is a common core practice to how all businesses operate. There however exists too much friction in the process of procuring goods and services, with potential risks lurking in the shadows.
Presently, the procurement of goods and services by organisations has become an issue of board-level priority. How companies handle their procurement could be a competitive advantage. As supply chains become more interconnected, global and dynamic, so does their unpredictability increase, posing more risk.
There also exists a regulatory concern on a company’s procurement practices, owing to an increase in demands by businesses, regulators and customers to have ethically and sustainably sourced goods and services. This has cumulatively increased the pressure on businesses to understand everything about who they do business with. This adds friction, as it involves information sourcing, sorting, verifying and constantly updating suppliers and supply information, which is cumbersome.
Contingent, as a solution to modern procurement concerns
Launched in 2020 by a team of AI and financial risk tech veterans, Tai Alegebe and Rajpal Wilkhu, Contingent was conceptualized, designed and developed to fundamentally change how procurement was done. Contingent primarily operates out of London, impacting the world
Contingent’s tool is a lightweight, easy-to-use and set up software that fits seamlessly into an organisation’s existing procurement workflow and technology ecosystem, providing proactive insights and answers required by a team needing to act.
Contingent’s cloud-based platform assists organisations in procuring more strategically, better managing supply chain risk as well as complying with regulatory frameworks encountered.
Growth and expansion for contingent
The company employs an exciting mix of risk technology veterans and AI researchers operating at the crossroads of data and computer science, due diligence, supply chain risk and risk screening. Since its launch, Contingent has recorded ten-fold customer base growth, with key note-worthy clients such as Monzo, Seagate, Huel, Barratt Developments plc, and HM Government among many others.
Having experienced strong global demand for its services, Contingent is looking into expanding into the US and across Europe. The company, moreover, expects to be rapidly hiring into its product, engineering, and commercial teams over the coming months.
“There is an ever-increasing amount of focus on risk management within supply chains and Contingent provides us with a platform to capture the key areas of risk. As we put more of a spotlight on ESG, the team at Contingent is continuously improving the platform, its features and coverage, which supports us as we continue to grow as a business,” said Steven McGeagh, Senior Procurement Manager at Huel.
