Recurly Notches $19.5M To Grow Subscription Business

To bolster its subscription business, San-Francisco-based Recurly has notched $19.5 million in funding led by F-Prime Capital along with participation from Polaris Partners, Silicon Valley Bank and Greycroft. The new funding brings its total raise to almost $40 million after raises in the past totaling $19.6 million, VentureBeat reported.

“The subscription commerce market is undergoing a dramatic shift as consumer purchasing behaviors are quickly evolving to expect flexible, pay-as-you-go models from their favorite brands,” CEO Dan Burkhart said in a statement per the outlet. “We are excited about the role that our company plays in helping these high growth brands to innovate with subscriptions in a way that delights their customers while delivering breakout results against their competitors.”

With the newest round, Recurly added two new executives to its team. Shane Oren comes on board as SVP of sales following stints at Nice Satmetrix and NetSuite. Tony Allen, a former platform and architecture engineer, joins as chief technology officer.

Subscriptions are a large business, with McKinsey & Company estimating that 15 percent of eCommerce customers have begun one or more product subscriptions within the past year, according to a report in Forbes. The McKinsey survey puts the growth rate of the market for recurring eCommerce from 2013 through 2018 at more than 100 percent a year.

In separate news, Bank of America Merchant Services announced a partnership with Recurly in May. The two companies said in a press release at the time that they are teaming up to help merchants make money from subscriptions and to analyze their subscription business health, with the inclusion of customer loyalty as well as subscriber engagements.

Customers who use the combined services of Bank of America Merchant Services and Recurly will be able to take payments globally, manage the lifecycle of the subscriber and provide more flexible subscription and billing plans. Customers also receive analytics and insights into the business.