UpCounsel Raises $10 Million in Series A Funding Led by Menlo Ventures
Online marketplace for legal services ushers in next wave of on-demand workforce; Investment will accelerate further adoption among businesses and lawyers
SAN FRANCISCO, July 28, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- UpCounsel today announced it has secured $10 million in Series A funding to accelerate further adoption of its on-demand legal marketplace. New investor Menlo Ventures led the funding round with participation from previous investors including Homebrew and Metamorphic Ventures. The company has raised $13.9 million to date and offers cost-effective legal counsel to businesses while equipping attorneys with the necessary tools to grow and manage their practices effortlessly.
"Businesses and their decisions makers - from CEOs to General Counsels - use UpCounsel to complement or replace the expensive and less efficient services of traditional law firms," said Matt Faustman, CEO of UpCounsel. "We obsess about giving businesses access to the very best attorneys, and then supporting them with tools to make the traditionally painful service relationship productive, transparent, and cost-effective. We've even had some law firms start to hire ad hoc legal staff through us because it's just that efficient."
UpCounsel empowers the next wave of the on-demand workforce, professionals and white collar workers. In 2014, UpCounsel's top 10 attorneys made more than $1 million in aggregate. Attorneys who use UpCounsel get immediate access to the company's free practice management, marketing, document, and payment tools on top of guaranteed payments and assistance with collections and payment plans for clients.
"The key to success here is to equally invest in amazing products that empower our lawyer community," said Faustman. "The future of legal services lays with the solopreneur lawyer, and we are just at the starting line of unlocking their impact on the industry."
This year, UpCounsel has experienced 20 percent month-over-month in revenue growth and 30 percent month-over-month in lawyer signups across the U.S. The new round will be used to expand the company's sales and marketing teams while continuing to expand on features that put UpCounsel in center of the business/lawyer relationship.
"On-demand marketplaces are where the next 10 million jobs will be created and today's 'Right Now Economy' is only going to continue to grow which is a vital reason why we wanted to assist with UpCounsel's growth and progression," said Venky Ganesan, managing director at Menlo Ventures. "We're at the cusp of a golden age and UpCounsel is at the forefront of providing high quality professional services."
For more information visit UpCounsel.com.
About UpCounsel
UpCounsel is on a mission to make the legal experience remarkable for businesses. We provide small and medium businesses with an alternative to expensive and slow legal services through an online platform and an all-star virtual lawyer community. UpCounsel is working with thousands of entrepreneurs and companies to increase the quality and speed of legal services while dramatically reducing costs. When businesses have easy access to great legal services, they make better decisions and can grow their business with confidence. The company is currently based in San Francisco, CA. For more information, please visit: www.upcounsel.com
About Menlo Ventures
Menlo Ventures provides capital for seed through growth technology companies in the consumer and enterprise sectors. Since 1976, the firm's market-driven analysis has led to the identification of and successful exits in innovative technology markets. Notable areas of investment include Mobile (Siri, Uber, Machine Zone, Roku), Social & Ecommerce (Tumblr, Lumosity, Poshmark), Cloud (Carbonite, EdgeCast, Dropcam, Vidyo), Storage & Big Data (3Par, Coraid, Tintri, Avere Systems), Digital Advertising (Flurry, YuMe, DataXu, Dstillery, eXelate) and Security (Cavium, IronPort, nCircle, BitSight). Menlo's portfolio includes 70+ public companies and 100+ mergers and acquisitions. Menlo's guiding philosophy is to Venture Right, working side-by-side with portfolio entrepreneurs as allies, serving ethically on boards as company builders with decades of market expertise, and opening access to a curated network of advisors. Menlo Ventures has $4 Billion under management and is currently investing Menlo Ventures XII, a $400M fund with $15M allocated to the Menlo Talent Fund for fast seed funding. For more information, visit www.menlovc.com.
Media Contact: North 6th Agency (for UpCounsel)
212-334-9753, [email protected]
SOURCE UpCounsel
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