Bentonville tech firm raises $2M in seed funding
by August 27, 2021 1:01 pm 1,353 views
Bentonville technology firm Stonehenge Technology Labs announced Friday (Aug. 27) $2 million in seed funding for its Stopwatch artificial intelligence and machine learning software product for CPG companies.
According to a company news release, IrishAngels led the round with participation from Bread and Butter Ventures, Gaingels, Angeles Investors, Bonfire Ventures, and Red Tail Venture Capital.
Stonehenge said the new funding follows early investment from multiple angels who are C-Suite executives spanning retail technology and CPG.
“We are excited to bring smart funding from exceptional partners to scale Stopwatch to more brands across the country,” founder and CEO Meagan Kinmoth Bowman said in a statement. “Stopwatch members are producing stuff people need, and by empowering those Member organizations to upcycle data they already have and have had for a long time, we’re able to increase sales an average of 10x. The kicker? The 10x represents the most profitable revenue on a per unit basis most CPG companies have ever experienced.”
Stonehenge said multiple Fortune 100 companies, as well as numerous emerging brands, are early Stopwatch users. The company’s data engineering, digital retail and artificial intelligence professionals have experience working for Jet.com, Walmart, and Amazon.
“We believe every individual member of all cross-functional teams should have one-touch access to performance metrics and action agendas spanning the entire organization,” Greg Yin, COO and head of membership architecture at Stonehenge, said in a statement.
Stonehenge launched three years ago as the technology and data science arm of an e-commerce intelligence firm. While SaaS companies are more commonly based in Silicon Valley, Bowman said her choice to have Stonehenge in Northwest Arkansas is “very purposeful and advantageous.”
“I moved to Bentonville in 2014 to be within close proximity of 1,200 of the world’s most sought-after CPG companies because I’ve known since that time I was going to build Stopwatch,” she said. “Building software that people actually love to use is no small task. Our team knows the closer we sit with our users, the faster we’re able to deliver exactly what they need.”