Hudson Hill Backs Wholesale B2B Platform MarketTime

Hudson Hill Capital has made a “significant” majority investment in B2B wholesale platform MarketTime.

The private investment firm announced the funding Tuesday (Dec. 5), describing MarketTime as a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform whose tools help facilitate more than $6 billion in wholesale retail commerce between brands, manufacturer representatives, agents and retailers.

“Founded in 2008, MarketTime’s software platform provides tools to sales representatives and agencies to automate the wholesale transaction process and has expanded to offer a similar platform to manufacturers,” Hudson Hill said in a news release provided to PYMNTS.

“These order management products automate the repeated interactions of buyers and sellers within wholesale retail commerce, replacing paper, pencil, email and Excel processes. The company also offers configurable branded websites to brands and analytics tools to brands, agencies and retailers.”

Eric Rosen, Hudson Hill’s managing partner, said his group sees opportunities to expand MarketTime’s product features and further automate “the wholesale commerce workflow.”

The funding follows recent PYMNTS intelligence that shows upgrading financial infrastructure through automation and digital transformation initiatives is a key way for businesses to excel in a competitive marketplace.

This data is echoed by recent comments from industry leaders, such as Ben Weiner, senior vice president and global head of B2B payments at Nuvei.

“What makes B2B payments such a great market is the presence of true white space, which is rare in payments today,” he told PYMNTS last month.

“Innovation in B2B payments is heating up,” Tom Randklev, global head of product at CellPoint Digital, said in a separate conversation. “And it’s centered around the ongoing digitization of the space, which brings a lot of optimization around operational efficiencies, cost efficiencies and just a better way of moving money.”

Yet not every business is on board with automation just yet.

“Accounts Payable and Receivable Trends and the Path to Profitability,” a PYMNTS Intelligence and American Express collaboration, found that more than one-third of mid-sized U.S. companies have not introduced any automation within their accounts payable (AP) or accounts receivable (AR) operations.

But the tide could be turning, Kat Battle, product manager for Complete AP at Bank of America, told PYMNTS last month.

“More and more organizations are recognizing the need to update and modernize what has historically been a manual, paper-based process — but one that’s also very mission critical to the business function,” she said.