German tech start-up wants to expand in the USA

His co-founder Jenny von Podewils adds that they want to expand their position as market leader globally: “Our platform has proven itself and is meeting a ready market.” The pressure to transform in corporations and medium-sized companies is immense. “In recent years it has become clear that this transformation can only succeed with motivated and well-deployed employees,” says von Podewils.

The company promises its customers to use a software platform based on artificial intelligence to strengthen the internal feedback and learning culture and to retain employees in the long term. So far, Leapsome has grown from cash flow. According to its own statements, it is already profitable. Sales tripled in the past year to a double-digit million euro amount.

The two 36-year-old founders managed it with a common vision and a clear, complementary division of labor. Kajetan von Armansperg is the product developer, Jenny von Podewils the saleswoman. They have managed the company on an equal footing since it was founded in 2016, making them an exception in the tech scene, which is heavily dominated by men. They now employ around 80 people.

Leapsome founders have ambitious growth goals

Leapsome now has more than 1000 customers in Europe, the USA, Asia and Australia. These include global brands such as Spotify or Mercedes Benz, but also German medium-sized companies such as CTS Eventim. With Leapsome, they automate and professionalize their feedback and training processes, some of which were still manual to date, by merging them on one platform and linking them to other communication channels – such as Slack, Microsoft Teams or HR systems such as Workday and Personio.

Christian Grobe, head of fintech Billie, praises the concept: “Leapsome saves us a lot of time in performance reviews and helps us to build an open, value-oriented feedback culture. We compared several platforms and Leapsome won us over – it’s easy to use, intuitive and highly customizable.”

The growth targets of the founders are ambitious: “We want to generate more than 100 million euros in sales by 2024,” says von Armansperg. In recent years, the focus has been on building efficient and automated processes, which has resulted in high capital efficiency. This allowed Leapsome to focus on customers and on rapid further development of the platform.

This is the first round of financing for the company. “The previous renunciation of external financing was always pragmatically and not dogmatically motivated,” says von Armansperg, “We have continuously checked when the right moment is.”

That point was reached at the beginning of the year. Von Podewils and von Armansperg went looking for investors. They specifically addressed tech investors. “We were looking for a strategic partner from a position of strength,” says von Podewils. An agreement was quickly reached with Insight Partners, after just a few weeks the commitment was complete. It was also crucial that the investors, like themselves, are diverse.

More about new work:

Leapsome is another Berlin start-up in the field of human resources management that is financially strengthened and is expanding internationally. At the beginning of 2021, the founders of Tandemploy, who became pioneers of the new work scene with their software for collaborative work, received new capital. A few weeks ago, Tandemploy was taken over by the US tech group Phenom.

At Leapsome, the fresh money is to flow into expansion in the USA, where 15 percent of the business has been done so far. The founders want to open their own office in New York. In addition, the platform is to be expanded with new modules.

With the arrival of the investors, the founding duo, who have known each other since studying at the Universities of Mannheim and St. Gallen, are also handing over shares for the first time. So far, they each held 50 percent. With Insight Partners, the first minority shareholder is now joining.

Millennials have different expectations of the world of work

With the investors, the two co-CEOs have also gained a strategic sparring partner. Insight Partners is a $90 billion global tech investor with investments in more than 600 companies worldwide and has taken more than 55 portfolio companies public.

Katie Bullard, Managing Partner at Insight, will join Leapsome’s previously two-person board. “Increasing employee engagement is at the core of any business strategy, and Leapsome has positioned itself as a global leader,” said Bullard. “We are extremely excited to be working with Kajetan, Jenny and the entire Leapsome team as the company grows, scales and advances its mission of helping employees around the world be happy at work.”

Leapsome’s business model is based on its own “painful experiences,” as the founders say. They took their first career steps in fast-growing start-ups, where cooperation and the question of meaning sometimes fell by the wayside.

There is also positive psychology. In particular, Jenny von Podewils, who studied at Singularity University in Silicon Valley, dealt with the question: “What makes people in organizations successful?” Her answer: “In the course of life, people work around 80,000 hours. We would like to make a contribution to ensuring that all employees can develop and flourish during this time.”

The young generation is increasingly changing the labor market. Millennials expect employers to have a strong culture of fulfilling work and personal growth. “Anyone who does not meet these requirements as an employer will lose their best employees,” says von Podewils.

More: Leapsome founder Jenny von Podewils in an interview with the Handelsblatt