Smart Home Platform Plume Raises $270 Million For Research, Growth

Smart home tech company Plume raised $270 million in a Series E funding round, valuing the company at $1.35 billion.

The funding represents a minority investment from Insight Partners, a global venture capital and private equity firm, according to a press release, and brings Plume’s total funding to $397 million.

Even before the pandemic, consumers were making their homes the centers of their connected commerce world, Karen Webster noted last year. And over the last year especially, they have “refocused how they shop, bank, work, work out, worship, eat, entertain themselves and their families.”

“Consumers have stayed home while they’ve interacted virtually with nearly every aspect of their reality,” bringing the connected home, and the smart home, to the forefront.

Plume uses its cloud-based platform to “address the disconnect between the expectations of smart spaces and the service provider’s ability to deliver flawless experiences to them,” Plume Co-Founder and CEO Fahri Diner said in the press release. The company services over 170 Communications Service Providers (CSPs) operating in over 22 million homes around the world.

Plume’s customers use Plume’s OpenSync open platform to manage their smart devices, and through HomePass, they can access a suite of services including artificial intelligence (AI)-based cybersecurity and IoT device protection, motion awareness, secure access controls, parent supervision tools and Wi-Fi. On the back end, its operations platform tracks consumer behavior and satisfaction and offers real-time and predictive customer support tools.

“Growth in the smart home category is exploding, but the quality of consumer experience has fallen short,” said Insight Partners Managing Director Ryan Hinkle, a newly appointed director on Plume’s board.

The funding will support Plume’s expansion in North America, Europe and Asia, and will also go to increased research and development, partnerships and its sales and marketing efforts.

Plume raised $85 million in a funding round last year.