Veeqo raises £200,000 and announces global growth plan

Swansea-based tech firm Veeqo, which creates software for online sellers, has raised £200,000 in a recent crowdfunding campaign to accelerate growth.

The Welsh e-commerce software firm took to crowdfunding website Seedrs for its ninth funding campaign and quickly raised £200,000 with the backing of nearly 75 investors.

Over the past year, the company has achieved a great deal of growth. Last December, it raised £1.2 million through Seedrs in a bid to expand its team and product offering.

As a result of this funding boost, Veeqo has been able to hire 20 new employees over the past 12 months, and it’s planning to create an additional 168 jobs over the next three years.

Cerys Davies is one of the firm’s latest additions. Heading up human resources, she relocated to Swansea after spending the previous 12 years in New York leading the North America HR department for internet giant Trustpilot.

At the time, Economy Secretary Ken Skates said: “We are pleased to support the expansion of Swansea based Veeqo. This innovative creative digital company is at the forefront of the E-commerce revolution.

“And we are proud to see its continuous growth worldwide. The company is due to create over 180 high quality jobs in the Swansea region and I look forward to their ongoing success.”

Speaking to Tech Dragons, Veeqo founder and CEO Matt confirmed that his company is hoping to raise around $5 million (£3.7 million) in 2018 to launch globally.

“In 2018 we will be raising a funding round of around $5 million,” he said. “So in advance of this, we have launched this small crowdfunding campaign, mainly for our existing investors, to ensure we keep pushing hard until next year,

“The plan is to use money from this round to expand into further countries and take Veeqo global.

Back in September, he said:  “I’m really proud that we’ve secured this world class tech industry talent to join Veeqo in Wales,” he said.

“Outside the main startup areas like Silicon Valley and London it is more challenging to find the right talent as we scale the company, but this proves it can be done and I am really excited about the future.”