Brightflag Raises $28M to Give Enterprises Greater Control Over Legal Work
(December 9, 2020) Brightflag, the AI-powered legal spend management and matter management platform, today announced the completion of a $28 million growth equity investment led by One Peak, with participation from existing investors Sands Capital Ventures and Frontline Ventures. Brightflag will use the funds to expand its international footprint while accelerating product innovation to sustain its best-in-class customer experience.
According to a recent Gartner survey, the share of corporate legal operations leaders responsible for coordinating law firm billing and tracking outside counsel spend metrics increased in the past two years alone by 53 and 32 percentage points, respectively, becoming a key priority for enterprises. However, the report also suggests that enabling tools are not keeping pace with these evolving priorities. Nearly half of survey respondents cited technology solutions and adoption rates as their most prominent operational weakness revealed during the COVID-19 crisis.
“For the second time in the last 15 years, companies are grappling with the legal and financial implications of a global recession,” said Brightflag CEO and co-founder Ian Nolan. “Brightflag is providing corporate legal departments with unparalleled visibility into their operations as they work to maximize the strategic value of their spending.”
Brightflag’s proprietary AI solution gives a data-based perspective of not only the rates and subtotals billed within a legal invoice, but the specific tasks and activities performed as well. The resulting insights have already helped brands like Dropbox, Volvo, and AccuWeather better evaluate law firm performance, refine resourcing strategies, and sharpen financial forecasts.
“Brightflag has transformed the way we manage our legal spend,” said Dan Cook, VP of Legal at Dropbox. “We’ve automated away several time-consuming processes, gained complete visibility into how we’re tracking against budget, and been supported by top-notch customer service at every step.”
“We are incredibly excited to back Brightflag and its founders as we see enormous potential in accelerating digital transformation within the legal department and redefining its role from cost center to essential business partner,” said Humbert de Liedekerke, Managing Partner of One Peak. “We look forward to supporting the company in its next phase of growth.”
Despite COVID-19, Brightflag managed to almost double its annual recurring revenue (ARR) in the past year. To continue on that trajectory in 2021, Brightflag intends to hire approximately 60 new employees between its US and global teams over the next year.
About Brightflag
Brightflag enables organizations to take control of their legal spend with AI-powered software that’s easy to use and backed by proactive customer support. Brightflag processes billions of dollars of legal spend annually on behalf of its customers, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in savings and tens of thousands of hours in avoided administrative work. Founded in 2014, Brightflag serves a global community of in-house legal teams and their vendors from its offices in Dublin, New York, and Sydney.
About One Peak
One Peak is a growth equity firm investing in technology companies in the scale-up phase. The firm provides growth capital to exceptional entrepreneurs with a view to transform innovative and rapidly growing businesses into lasting, category-defining leaders. In addition to Brightflag, One Peak’s investments include HighQ, Neo4j, DocPlanner, Spryker Systems, Concentra Analytics, Quentic, Coople, DataGuard, Keepit and PandaDoc.