SaaS startup Hygraph is on a mission to empower a new generation of content creators to build connected digital experiences at scale. The Berlin-based startup has just raised over €27 million ($30 million) to scale.
Content is a growing market, relevant to organisations of all sizes, markets and generations. In today’s world, the focus is on creating connecting digital experiences. For creators, this means jumping between different content sources and devices and monitoring content on various platforms – all of which require a lot of time, money and resources.
Founded in 2017, Hypgraph aims to empower a new approach to content management, that enables creators to create content at scale. The startup has just closed its Series B funding round at over €27 million ($30 million).
The funding was led by One Peak. Existing investor OpenOcean, alongside Peak, SquareOne and new business angel, Boris Lokschin (Co-Founder and CEO of Spryker Systems), also participated.
The rise of content creation has been an exciting trend to watch over the past decade and it’s a market that is constantly evolving. With the growth of social media, and changing content consumption habits and preferences, content development also requires near-constant rethinking and imagination.
A decade ago, we saw the rise of the headless CMS, allowing for platform-independent content distribution via APIs. However, with the emergence of composable architecture, organisations have found themselves needing to build and manage custom middleware to connect to other existing content sources alongside their headless CMS.
That’s where Hygraph comes in. The Berlin-based startup has developed a solution that is tailored to this new generation of content management requirements.
Michael Lukaszczyk, CEO and Co-Founder, Hygraph: “The demand for connected digital services shows no sign of slowing down, but building everything custom is costly and an innovation bottleneck. Today, organisations not only need to distribute content to multiple devices, but they also need to access and serve up content from a myriad of sources.”
Hygraph’s federated content platform aims to enable organisations to innovate faster and at a lower cost. It enables them to build content-rich applications, manage large product catalogues and control internal knowledge management systems. Replacing middleware development, Hygraph allows organisations to connect siloed content that resides across their entire software stack, via a single API.
This approach allows product teams to compose services up to ten times quicker than current methods.
Michael Lukaszczyk: “In the same way the headless CMS changed content distribution, Hygraph is disrupting the integration of content and data to enable the creation of new digital services and business models in the content economy. Our new funding round will allow us to further scale our business, as we aim to do for content management what the likes of MuleSoft did for integration.”
The innovative company currently works with over 400 companies, including brands like Dr. Oetker, Shure, Samsung, Philips and Ashley Furniture.
David Klein, Co-founder and Managing Partner, and Tatjana Kast, Director, One Peak: “Despite the rise of the composable enterprise, many organisations are unable to unlock full value from their content. Hygraph solves the customisation and integration challenges that continue to slow the creation of new or complex digital services at scale. We have been hugely impressed with Hygraph’s strong and capital-efficient growth trajectory and believe that its federated content platform presents a sizeable market opportunity. One Peak is incredibly excited to back the excellent Hygraph team and its founders in their next phase of explosive growth.”
With this new funding, the team plans to supercharge platform development and scale go-to-market plans, with a focus on North America.
Ekaterina Almasque, General Partner, OpenOcean: “We are honoured to be able to continue to support Hygraph’s journey. The Series B validates the company’s unique position as an emerging leader in the next-generation enterprise content management stack. Its powerful GraphQL-native federated platform enables customers to build products like streaming services or fast-moving catalogues with unprecedented speed and ease, without relying on large engineering teams. We’re delighted to be involved in the strides that Hygraph has made since our early-stage investment to reposition the company, rebrand, and show their unique proposition to the enterprise market.”
