Takumi raises $4m Series B to expand US office

Influencer marketing platform Takumi just announced a $4m (£3m) Series B round from UK and US angels and investment funds. The company raised a $4m Series A round in May 2017. The company was founded in 2015 by Guðmundur Eggertsson, Jökull Sólberg og Mats Stigzelius. It has over 40 employees with offices in Reykjavik, Berlin, London and New York.

“We will use the funding to grow our development team in Reykjavik and fuel continued growth in the US market,” commented CEO and co-founder Jökull Sólberg.

As a UK headquartered company, Takumi has benefited from the UK enterprise investment scheme when raising funds. Under the scheme, individual investors are incentivised to invest in new and innovative – and therefore riskier – companies. “Having our head office and parent company in London has been very beneficial for us due to this program,” Jökull told Northstack. “The UK has a good blueprint for how to create a good startup ecosystem.”

The company started by focusing on the UK and German markets, and launched a NYC satellite office in 2017, a late entrant there. “Our tech and commercial presence in Europe is mature. We intend to use the new funds to expedite our US plans.”

The three year old company has worked with more than 800 brands and 15.000 influencers. “Takumi is already the leader in influencer marketing in Germany and the UK, the biggest advertising markets in Europe.”

Takumi connects brands and influencers on Instagram, a market that according to eMarketer doubled in 2017.

“Influencer marketing gets held to a higher standard as budgets grow” explains Jökull. “Consumers are wary of influencers working with the wrong brands, and brands are becoming aware of influencers with fake audiences. But we’ve seen that when it’s done right, and influencers have authentic audiences to sell in to brands it’s the most underpriced major marketing channel today and can have a major impact.”

Takumi is also announcing a new partnership with HypeAuditor, an influencer data vendor that is being integrated into influencer vetting and campaign reporting to bolster audience insights and further ensure that audiences are organic and not filled with bot accounts, a practice that is common in Instagram influencer marketing.

In the second quarter of this year, Takumi started working with Heinz and Gillette, and was nominated for the Digiday awards Best use of Social for their collaboration with Kellogg’s.

“Our focus on a superior influencer experience, and distributed sales teams close to the customer, has proven successful,” Jökull said. “The brands want excellent service and the influencers want a great app and trust to do their work. That is what Takumi stands for, and we believe will be the basis for our continued success in the US market.”