Synup raises $6 million from Vertex, Prime Ventures

BENGALURU: Synup, an online listing and marketing solution provider for local businesses, has raised $6 million as their first significant round of funding. The investment was led by Vertex Ventures along with existing investor, Prime Venture Partners.
Synup caters to local businesses in the US and Canada and helps track and manage their business profile online while providing them with marketing insights.The investment will be used to rapidly expand the company’s presence in Europe and accelerate product development.
“There are a lot of local stores in the US who do not have time to manage their online presence. We are a small team in India, and we have serviced 50,000 businesses. Our business is cashflow positive,” said Ashwin Ramesh.
The company was founded by Ramesh in 2013. A serial entrepreneur, Ramesh started his first company OrganicApex, an online advertising company at the age of 15 when he was still in high school. Synup works with both digital agencies and businesses directly to manage their listings on over 50 local search destinations.
Ben Mathias, Managing Partner of Vertex Ventures said, “Synup has been able to solve a difficult problem in a market that is largely under-penetrated. We have been impressed with the experience of their team and look forward to helping scale it.”
The biggest player in the space remains New York-based Yext, which recently went for an IPO and has most of the market share. However, Ramesh said that there is still scope for growth as out of the total 28 million local businesses in the US, only about a million (3.57%), use automated location-marketing services.
The company was first given a seed funding of $500,000 by Prime Ventures in 2014. Shripati Acharya, Managing Partner, Prime Venture Partners said that the company was amongst the first wave of global SaaS companies to come out of India.
In the next six months, the company wants to go beyond location data management and offer a wider breadth of products to its customers.